A funny, provocative and immensely entertaining satire, "Saved!" goes after the religious hypocrisy at a Christian high school with cutting and effective wit.
Life is peachy for Mary (Jena Malone, "Donnie Darko"). She's a popular student at American Eagle Christian High School, she has all the right friends, her mother (Mary-Louise Parker) has just been named the #1 Christian Interior Decorator, and she has the perfect boyfriend, Dean (Chad Faust). Things get complicated when Dean spontaneously tells her he thinks he's gay. After bumping her head and having an hallucination, she decides that God wants her to "cure" him by having sex with him.
Before she can find out if it worked, his parents find out his secret and ship him off to a place called Mercy House for "de-gayification". Then she finds out she's pregnant. Life isn't peachy for Mary anymore, and ironically it's the best thing that could have ever happened to her.
Up until this point, Mary's best friend has been Hilary Faye (Mandy Moore), a smugly superior, self-serving beeyatch who looks down her nose at everyone around her under the guise of trying to "help" them. Moore, who seems to thankfully lack all the annoying pretensions of her pop-singer peers, is really developing into a great actress, and here she takes a supremely hate-able character and really has fun with the role. As a character, Hilary Faye is almost on a par with "Election"'s Tracy Flick (played by a still-cool Reese Witherspoon), and that's saying something.
For once, actually experiencing problems that are frowned upon at a Christian high school firsthand, Mary can see how shallow and hypocritical Hilary Faye and her other friends are, and begins gravitating towards the unpopular kids in school, like Hilary Faye's paraplegic younger brother Roland (Macauley Culkin) and the only Jewish kid in the school, rebellious Cassandra (Eva Amurri, in an awesome performance).
The stellar cast also includes Martin Donovan as Pastor Skip, one of those annoying preachers who think that going by their first name and using slang ("Let's kick it Jesus-style!") will make him "cool" to the kids, Patrick Fugit ("Almost Famous") as Pastor Skip's son, a kind and non-judgmental kid who Mary takes a liking to, and Heather Matarazzo ("Welcome To The Dollhouse") as one of Hilary Faye's jealous friends.
As with most effective satires, "Saved!" is pissing off a lot of hardcore Christians because they find it offensive. They don't get it. The movie is not poking fun at religion itself, only the narrow-minded hypocrites who use it selfishly to discriminate against others and make themselves feel superior.
After Hilary Faye angrily throws a Bible at Mary after a silly, failed "exorcism", Mary picks up the Bible and says "This is not a weapon!". She means it literally, of course, but such a statement resonates on many different levels.
I'm making "Saved!" sound much more serious than it is. It has important points to make, but first and foremost it's a comedy, and it's a very funny one, with many well-written and likable characters. Highly recommended.
Life is peachy for Mary (Jena Malone, "Donnie Darko"). She's a popular student at American Eagle Christian High School, she has all the right friends, her mother (Mary-Louise Parker) has just been named the #1 Christian Interior Decorator, and she has the perfect boyfriend, Dean (Chad Faust). Things get complicated when Dean spontaneously tells her he thinks he's gay. After bumping her head and having an hallucination, she decides that God wants her to "cure" him by having sex with him.
Before she can find out if it worked, his parents find out his secret and ship him off to a place called Mercy House for "de-gayification". Then she finds out she's pregnant. Life isn't peachy for Mary anymore, and ironically it's the best thing that could have ever happened to her.
Up until this point, Mary's best friend has been Hilary Faye (Mandy Moore), a smugly superior, self-serving beeyatch who looks down her nose at everyone around her under the guise of trying to "help" them. Moore, who seems to thankfully lack all the annoying pretensions of her pop-singer peers, is really developing into a great actress, and here she takes a supremely hate-able character and really has fun with the role. As a character, Hilary Faye is almost on a par with "Election"'s Tracy Flick (played by a still-cool Reese Witherspoon), and that's saying something.
For once, actually experiencing problems that are frowned upon at a Christian high school firsthand, Mary can see how shallow and hypocritical Hilary Faye and her other friends are, and begins gravitating towards the unpopular kids in school, like Hilary Faye's paraplegic younger brother Roland (Macauley Culkin) and the only Jewish kid in the school, rebellious Cassandra (Eva Amurri, in an awesome performance).
The stellar cast also includes Martin Donovan as Pastor Skip, one of those annoying preachers who think that going by their first name and using slang ("Let's kick it Jesus-style!") will make him "cool" to the kids, Patrick Fugit ("Almost Famous") as Pastor Skip's son, a kind and non-judgmental kid who Mary takes a liking to, and Heather Matarazzo ("Welcome To The Dollhouse") as one of Hilary Faye's jealous friends.
As with most effective satires, "Saved!" is pissing off a lot of hardcore Christians because they find it offensive. They don't get it. The movie is not poking fun at religion itself, only the narrow-minded hypocrites who use it selfishly to discriminate against others and make themselves feel superior.
After Hilary Faye angrily throws a Bible at Mary after a silly, failed "exorcism", Mary picks up the Bible and says "This is not a weapon!". She means it literally, of course, but such a statement resonates on many different levels.
I'm making "Saved!" sound much more serious than it is. It has important points to make, but first and foremost it's a comedy, and it's a very funny one, with many well-written and likable characters. Highly recommended.