Six Days in August

Looking back nearly two centuries, this fascinating view is both touching and enlightening of the interplay between Joseph Smith, Brigham Young, and other apostles and early restored gospel leaders. It repeatedly portrays intense human reactions as these people led the church in hostile circumstances to follow God's commandments. After years of oppression, it is striking to see intense personal dramas as Joseph Smith was martyred, with a focus on what then to do. We see how there was so much needed and how the early church responded. The superb acting, writing, direction, cinematography, and music absolutely brought it home.

It tells the story of the martyrdom of Joseph Smith and Brigham Young's succession to the leadership. The story is very complicated with a lot of characters and the writer/director, Mark Goodman, does a fantastic job of making the story engaging and easy to follow. It was a well-written, well-acted film with beautiful cinematography and a great soundtrack. You may never have heard of any of these actors. But they were all great and I hope to see them in other films for years to come. It is worth staying for the closing credits to hear the song O Give Me Back My Prophet Dear, with lyrics by John Taylor, music by Rob Gardner, and sung by Casey Elliott. It is a great film that tells an important story in Church history.

My family and I saw this fim over the weekend. I knew most of the history protrayed in this film. My family members did not know the history protrayed. We all enjoyed this film! On the way home we all talked about the movie, and what we liked about it. Even though the movie did some jumping back and forth between time periods, no one was confused. This film deplicts a crucial time in the history of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and a time in US history. The cimenatography was beautiful! I would recommend this to everyone! You may want to watch Witnesses first (which is also a great film), just to understand the history of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints a little better.

The Good -- for all of its cult potential, and my goodness this film is filled with, the song playing through the end credits was haunting and beautiful.

The Bad -- this movie makes Witnesses look like Citizen Kane, despite having a 2 million dollar budget. It just goes to show that money can't salvage a dookie script.

The Ugly -- if you were on a small passenger plane flying over Delta, UT, Six Days might not be preferable to simply staring into your airsickness bag.

I know what you're thinking... 'Just tell us whether you liked it.' Consider this, the film is pure fiction. Almost everything on the screen never happened. Women didn't love the idea of polygamy, there was not transfiguration of Brigham Young and the truth is that Joseph Smith ordered the destruction of the printing press because it was going to publish the truth about Joseph Smith and his many wives.

There is absolutely no reason to see this movie unless you are a glutton for punishment or if you enjoy being gaslit for 2 hours.

Beautifully filmed, well acted, and not afraid to tackle difficult topics or to depict disagreement and even strife. Also quite funny at points.

I would recommend this film to just about anybody who's old enough to follow a somewhat involved plot -- but, of course, it will appeal most to members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

It does a good job of telling a dramatic story that made a huge amount of difference, in the years that followed, to the history of the American West and especially to the history of the Church. It's educational but entertaining. I really enjoyed it myself.

Go see it! Time well spent!