5.4 stars.
This is about as real as it gets and yet it misses the mark by a longshot. This is a film about a bunch of people pretending to be Christians, and although we know that is what we might get from a movie like this, it still caught me by surprise. Being one of the lowest rated films for me in the past year, it goes without saying I'm disappointed. The real theme is this: 'A Walk with Grace' portrays several very pretty women (uncharacteristically) who are strutting around in order to get the attention of the men. They are in church, walking around the town, in the school for wrestling matches (this seems to be the real theme at times). There is a Christian gathering in a bar, they sing Amazing Grace, the guitar work is brilliant, but they are drinking (some of them heavily) and trading glances and doing a "dance" where all the single men are eying all the single women in order to "hook up" in a subtle way, probably to make it seem like it's all done in some Christian fashion. In that respect this film is a genuine rendition of a gathering of "religious" people just playing the game of life and trying to uphold some sort of facade. I've seen this sort of group behavior my whole life in the church gathering settings. All I can leave you with is that I won't judge the depiction of what people might really be like in this sort of situation, because this seems realistic and frankly - unfortunate.
The protagonist is not really that, he's a confused man who is still mourning the death of his wife. His daughter is actually the best part of the film, but she gets way too few scenes in which to shine. The "main" female is Grace, but she doesn't carry the role at all. She seems like a secondary trying to fit into a primary role, yet the writing is splintered and unorthodox, thereby diminishing any impact from her character. The sister in law is way too pretty to be strutting around and getting with the police officer, it makes no sense, why is she even here? And the actual sister is like an enemy/stranger. Her role is just alien to the whole story and makes zero sense. This film needs to start from scratch with a new screenwriter and director. The actors, cinematography, and editing have a lot of potential, the writing is bad... really bad. The director dropped the ball.
