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| Oh, Christ... |
I'm cheating a little bit, because this isn't even a Christmas movie, but for some reason I equated it with one the first time I saw it and so I'm just going to pretend it is (though, in my defense, a character does oddly have a Christmas tree in the background during an early scene...). But there's no way I just sat through this, for a second time, with no possible course of action to warn the general public against watching this movie, under any circumstances.
This is that movie for people that saw the awful ChristianMingle.com ads and thought, “Wow, I wish they would drag this out to feature length”—and only for those zero people. I won't get into my whole viewpoints on religion, but it doesn't matter: no matter how you affiliate with Christianity, whether you're the world's biggest atheist or a preacher yourself, chances are great you'll be cringing your way through most of these 90 minutes. Even beyond its agonizing preachiness and judgmental tone, it only seems to want to show that in order to be a good Christian, you have to be a boring, terrible person.
Gwyneth (Lacey Chabert, of course) is a female marketing executive (of course!) desperate for love who sees all of her friends getting engaged, and so she decides the best possible course of action is to sign up for ChristianMingle.com, after seeing an ad for it on TV. Yeah, because even Christians think that's a logical step toward finding true love. Whatever. Anyway, there's only one problem: She is not technically a Christian. She's not against the idea, mind you, she just doesn't practice Christianity by reading a bible or going to church every Sunday and, by the guidelines of the people involved in making this movie, that apparently means she's a piece of shit and going directly to hell. Oh, and we already know from an introductory voiceover that she finds both true love, and Him, telling us everything we need to know and honestly preventing us from even needing to watch it to know how it plays out.
Of course, through the service, she meets Paul, a practicing Christian who hosts weekly bible studies with his equally boring married friends, and who enjoys talking about Christ as much as possible. Paul is a smug little prick, the kind of person you want to punch in the face the first time you see him; by the end, you'll desperately want Gwyneth to fall in love with literally anyone else, preferrably a non-Christian that she can have engaging conversations, and loads of premarital sex, with.
Anyway, to speed this up, Paul goes in a missionary trip to Mexico without even telling Gwyneth (because that's a pretty Christian thing to do) and then invites her to come down with him, only once he's there, and on a complete whim. She drops what she is doing, and buys a fucking plane ticket to Mexico, only to have her “true intentions” outed by a copy of Christianity for Dummies (seriously, true story), because, apparently, no one is allowed to want to learn more about religion, and because traveling to Mexico in no way signals her love for him. After all, he's King Christian, and doesn't have to do any extra reading on the topic because he already knows every single shred of possible knowledge about the subject.
But no, that smug little prick sends her back home, appalled that the woman he fell for was just "pretending the whole time". So, of course Gwyneth spends her free time back in the States dedicating her life to Christ—and it's still not enough, when a few months (or weeks, or years, I don't even care) later, she has another run in with Paul, in which she calls out that the ex-girlfriend he is back together with, isn't even right for him. The smug little prick tells her she's out of line and that he will “pray for her”, but beyond that there is nothing he can do, and that they should never see each other again. Somehow, instead of slitting his throat right then and there, she takes that information to heart, quits her cushy marketing job and goes back to Mexico alone, to fulfill her dreams of being a teacher there. Paul comes for her, informs her he broke up with his ex, and then proposes. The End.
What do we learn? Well, for starters, put your religion above love, and settle for a fellow Christian, even if you do not want to be with them; if you're reading a purchased copy of Christianity for Dummies, you are just a poser and not at all interested in learning about religion; leaving your job just to visit a man in Mexico in no way proves loyalty or dedication to them; women should allow men to control and degrade them for "not being Christian enough"; ChristianMingle.com is a wonderful service, when used the way God intended.
RATING: 1/10
Of course, through the service, she meets Paul, a practicing Christian who hosts weekly bible studies with his equally boring married friends, and who enjoys talking about Christ as much as possible. Paul is a smug little prick, the kind of person you want to punch in the face the first time you see him; by the end, you'll desperately want Gwyneth to fall in love with literally anyone else, preferrably a non-Christian that she can have engaging conversations, and loads of premarital sex, with.
Anyway, to speed this up, Paul goes in a missionary trip to Mexico without even telling Gwyneth (because that's a pretty Christian thing to do) and then invites her to come down with him, only once he's there, and on a complete whim. She drops what she is doing, and buys a fucking plane ticket to Mexico, only to have her “true intentions” outed by a copy of Christianity for Dummies (seriously, true story), because, apparently, no one is allowed to want to learn more about religion, and because traveling to Mexico in no way signals her love for him. After all, he's King Christian, and doesn't have to do any extra reading on the topic because he already knows every single shred of possible knowledge about the subject.
But no, that smug little prick sends her back home, appalled that the woman he fell for was just "pretending the whole time". So, of course Gwyneth spends her free time back in the States dedicating her life to Christ—and it's still not enough, when a few months (or weeks, or years, I don't even care) later, she has another run in with Paul, in which she calls out that the ex-girlfriend he is back together with, isn't even right for him. The smug little prick tells her she's out of line and that he will “pray for her”, but beyond that there is nothing he can do, and that they should never see each other again. Somehow, instead of slitting his throat right then and there, she takes that information to heart, quits her cushy marketing job and goes back to Mexico alone, to fulfill her dreams of being a teacher there. Paul comes for her, informs her he broke up with his ex, and then proposes. The End.
What do we learn? Well, for starters, put your religion above love, and settle for a fellow Christian, even if you do not want to be with them; if you're reading a purchased copy of Christianity for Dummies, you are just a poser and not at all interested in learning about religion; leaving your job just to visit a man in Mexico in no way proves loyalty or dedication to them; women should allow men to control and degrade them for "not being Christian enough"; ChristianMingle.com is a wonderful service, when used the way God intended.
RATING: 1/10
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