Sound of Hope
Sound of Hope
Suspicion toward an Angel Studios picture is quite understandable; perhaps, because after all, this Utah based movie studio had already gained prominence last year with the surprising box office success of the child trafficking thriller Sound of Freedom. The box office takings of the Sound of Hope film reached 242 million dollars thanks to a star peddling QAnon conspiracy and the mass cathartic impulse of taking arms against what is termed as a godless, ‘woke’ Hollywood whom many of its supporters believe, sell and exploit children instead.
Thus, it is perhaps both unwarranted, and perhaps even self-defeating, that ‘Sound of Hope: The Story of Possum Trot’, the studio’s follow-up, is as boring and conventional as it gets. It is a good children’s welfare movie that treats the issue with respect and does not indulge in cheap thrills. It is the archetypal family-friendly storyline based on Christianity, which addresses the audience of the church without any objectionable details, playing guitar to God and losing sight of the gospel.
The sad story about adoption which the Sound of Hope film revolves around occurred in Possum Trot, the titular fictional or predominantly Black town in a backward East Texas. It’s a small town with a predominately black population, whose driving force is the active African-American Baptist church steered by Reverend W.C. Martin (Demetrius Grosse). His “First lady” Donna (Nika King) is completely overwhelmed by literally two children and an accumulating stack of bills. Lo and behold, in one of the darkest periods of her life, she is convinced that she hears God’s voice amidst the wind and trees encouraging her to keep going. She has been told, she continues, she should be Foster parent more. “Human ones?” W. C. barks at her, now totally bemused. Still, they soldier on, feeling the biblical compulsion to help the poor.
This is something which Susan Ramsey (Elizabeth Mitchell) understands, but consciously or subconsciously helps potential adopters evade, a caseworker with too much experience about the uselessness of the soaked foster care system in helping so many children in Texas’s case. But still, she takes the chance and allows the Martins to foster taken from broken homes — the most damaging of them is Terri (Diaana Babnicova), a little emotionally disturbed child who comes to them acting like a cat. Her antics are played for comedy, at least for most of the audience, in this instance at the beginning of the film. However, the films’ director Terry Weigel (who has co written the story with his wife Rebekah) manages to restore some balance, in the abundance of comedy and feelings, towards the end of the movie.
It is remarkable how the chimney sweepers encourage others in the community and before long, a total of 77 children occupy the residents of Possum Trot. At this point, “Story of Hope” turns into a warm family oriented drama, with the townsfolk learning about the highs and lows of such being on mission. Well, it is uplifting and Christian to take home as many vulnerable persons as possible, and the community of black church people embraces one another to assist. However as the reimbursements increases, emotional burdens do too and especially for Donna, whose a mother of many adopted kids who battles through their wounds and provocations each day.
As such, Weigel assumes control of events with total cheesiness, adopting an unsmiling approach to the audience with expressive actors and the appropriate sappy music. It is a movie that is very much dedicated to the idea of God working through individuals and the impact of the church, and particularly the black Southern church, as a catalyst for selfless acts. Surprisingly, the rhythms themselves are not that complex and there are problems with the two hour time length to make a completely uneventful tale entertaining.
I’m not saying that there’s anything wrong with such an agenda-driven view point: it is understood that adoption comes with its fair share of heartaches, not all cases are happy and the finances can be hard to pull. But given its relatively short run time, it does do out the angst of Resident Evil Afterlife which grows tiresome by the time it builds up around the cliched twisting of Terri’s psyche and her later on not so subtle baptism. Just when one would think the story was simple enough, it is given the kind of commentary that literally speaks to one of the themes and makes one wonder if Weigel’s cinematograph and surprisingly able cast is that untrustworthy.
“Sound of Hope: The Story of Possum Trot” is hardly in the propaganda level that “Sound of Freedom” was, it is even positive, it’s an uplifting and virtuous genre film about the help and involvement of the community, one of the rare faith-based films that focuses on the good side of religion instead of the mouth foaming twist of FiOX news.
Following the pattern established in “Sound of Freedom,” “Possum Trot” ends also not only with cut to real characters and their safe and bright future made possible by faith and community, but also with a several minutes long appeal to support the film.
The W.C. and Donna are seen pronouncing their lines from a teleprompter while a QR code on the screen urges the audience to ‘Pay It Forward’ and sponsor tickets that are free for others to utilize. It’s an innovative trick that propelled “Freedom” to great financial heights and furnished Angel Studios a template for its film marketing. I am not really certain how I feel about its model of creating fake grass roots campaigns in order to make profits. But if it has to be done, then I rather it be done to a film such as this that is clear about its intentions.
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- Genre: Drama
- Country: united states
- Director: Joshua Weigel
- Cast: Nika King, Demetrius Grosse, Elizabeth Mitchell
