God's Compass

A truly beautiful movie with some surprising turns. Just as the Bible assigns specific roles for widows / people after a certain age, so THEOS assigned in the precise moment of Suzanne's retirement to fill her life with a new responsibility. It is indeed a story THEOS could have written, of bringing together the dots in the right moment of time and to bring about something good out of misery and evil.

PROS

+ Great plot.

+ Great acting by Suzanne, Eli and his sister, average acting of David and Jessica.

+ Beautiful display of strength of Suzanne, in the time when she felt as having lost Eli, her car and 100k.

NEUTRAL

o Great Christian story, but no true redemption. Suzanne was sadly not able to lead Eli to true repentance for his acts, to lead him in prayer confessing his sins. The judge might have forgiven him, but what about THEOS? Though the end is beautiful and we could expect from this a changed life without further crimes.

O Overall great filmography, but the camera in the first scene in the car was not stable.

CONS

• The arrest of Eli was strange. We see no sign why the cop arrested him.

• The comment that prisoners who encounter IESOUS in prison and are being saved, return after their release always to their old life, is deeply ignorant, destructive and demotivating for all the workers of the Kingdom who labor in prison ministries. Nowhere in the movie is this devastating comment being corrected.

• The closing credits show highly problematic entries, such as Liberty University (Jerry Falwell and many controversies), Freemason Baptist Church (seriously???) and Holy Cross Regional Catholic School, but no denominational influence is noticed in the movie itself.

God's Compass is basically a story about a woman who decides to take custody of a troubled juvenile to save him from jail and help him in the right direction. That's the only connection to the title I can think of. Everything else about a compass seemed awkward and without any practical application. But if you can forget about that, it was actually a good movie. It had a good story, good script, good acting, and a happy ending. Sometimes we don't know the reasons why we are led to make certain decisions. In this movie, Mrs. Waters eventually finds out why. Jazelle Foster and Joey Ibanez, (who do not appear on the front cover of the DVD) gave exceptional performances. I think that they both have a bright future in the entertainment industry.

I'm all about plot and story and this film had the potential of being a hit in these areas with all that is introduced into the movie, but unfortunately most of this potential is just never realized. For example, I'm still not sure what the star's retirement from a school had to do with anything, but it would have been nice if that was developed more. And as mentioned by another reviewer, the name of the movie seems not to fit, but that's because they never really explained God's compass in the storyline. Sure, we knew the lead's husband liked boats and he had compasses and she talked about God leading us in the right direction, but because it was the title, it needed MORE. Perhaps those connecting scenes were left on the cutting room floor. Also, I'm not sure why both reviewers thought the acting was good. Yes, the lead, Karen Ambercrombie, was amazing. And the juvenile delinquent she cares for, Joey Ibanez, fit the part perfectly, but almost everyone else was various degrees of not quite realistic to just plain awful. For instance, Jessica (Jazelle Foster) is laughing and happy in the car when they come across her husband and Eli (Ibanez) looking for Eli's sister. Why it doesn't work is because even though her recently born child is doing better, he is still in the hospital in neonatal care. I'm not saying this movie isn't worth watching, I'm just saying that I know it could have been so much better, but it almost had a low budget feel. For instance, the sound seemed a bit off in a few places. Not even close to War Room.

This is a great movie about what can happen when people start trusting in and showing respect for each other. We're not perfect, but as long as we try our best.. even if later rather than sooner.. to do the right thing, things will eventually work out. Not in our time but God's time. This movie is very emotional and powerful. I cried a few times.

This movie will become a new Christian favorite, with excellent acting, good direction, excellent cinematography. The main characters are a couple of Christian film favorites: Karen Abercrombie and TC Stallings, from The War Room. There is also an appearance by Robert Amaya, whom you'll remember from Courageous. Its a well-made film about a family going through some tough issues, you feel like you're in there with them, going through what they're going through. What I really loved about this film is it gives you a little miracle - not a big one, but a little one - just miracle enough for the characters in the story to know that God's hand is in this.