Machine Gun Preacher: Target Missed

Shannon Vestal — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 03:05:00 PDT

Machine Gun Preacher is one part biopic, one part agenda film, but it's not satisfying in either respect. Gerard Butler stars as Sam Childers, an ex-convict who finds his calling in the form of helping orphans in Sudan, victims of the violent acts of the Lord's Resistance Army. Michelle Monaghan costars as Lynn, his frustrated wife trying to turn her life around. The film follows Sam back and forth from his home in Pennsylvania to the Sudan as he attempts to aid its citizens.

When we first meet Sam, he has just been released from prison, and he immediately goes back to what he was doing before he landed in jail: drinking, doing drugs, and committing crimes. After he almost kills a man while on a bender, Sam takes it as a sign and starts going to church. When he finds out about the plight of children in Africa, he travels overseas and sets about trying to help, eventually founding a refuge for the Sudanese kids. While the story itself is powerful, the subject matter of Sudan loses the spotlight in favor of the grandiose personality of its main character. To find out more, just keep reading

FitSugar

Machine Gun Preacher: Target Missed