NOTE: This review was written under a previous rating system. Some of the older reviews may express opinions and judgment calls that are not in line with our current standards.
2009John Robert Moore
HeuMoore Productions
What happens when a widow is about to lose her home to tax foreclosure and city expansion… and (unlike in all the other movies) people can’t just pitch in their own two mites and save the day through financial means—or (more unusual still) they won’t settle for a solution that easy or that safe? The Moore family and their friends the Mortons take the case all the way to the city hall and the silver screen… and the United States Postal Service. At least, that was the plan until reality set in and opposition showed up.
Despite the fact that The Widow’s Might could be labeled as a western, adversity doesn’t take the shape of gunslingers and cattle rustlers this time. Strangely enough, it doesn’t go after the heroes’ lives or even their relationships, either, despite the movie’s also being a drama. The movie-within-a-movie features seven fully-lyricized songs, which definitely qualify it as a musical, but ask most people in the audience for a list of musicals and it’ll be a while before they remember that The Widow’s Might even counts. And, despite the film’s also qualifying as a comedy, hardship only once smacks the protagonist in the head with a football. Notwithstanding all its other abnormalities, The Widow’s Might is definitely the quintessential… well, some kind of film. Even if it’s hard to pin down which aspect of it makes it so great, this movie’s got enough overarching appeal to blow away all of its negative elements… like the problem that there aren’t enough negative elements to make the objectionable-content part of the review flow very nicely.
In Language, we have one use of the word “stupid”—an appropriate word for the circumstances, but one that some families don’t necessarily want their little ones to start repeating. In Worldview, there’s a scene in which the youngest Moore is disrespectful to the mayor, and while it is mostly resolved, there is just a tiny smidge of it left up in the air. And, last but not least, in Cultural Stumbling-Blocks we have a song in which a character remarks on the oddities of the English language by asking “What were they drinking?” a number of times.
If you enjoy most independent Christian films and don’t mind poorly acted leads and a really predictable ending now and then—good for you. But if you were hoping for something with a little more excellence than that, The Widow’s Might may be just what you’re looking for in family entertainment. With a lot of charm, a lot of punch, a lively picture of biblical family life and an unusual slant on issues like property taxes and political involvement, The Widow’s Might has something to recommend to everybody, at every age. And with this movie’s list of applicable genres, I don’t think there’ll ever be another movie quite like it.
