His Only Son

The movie tries to jump around in the story artistically, but it's confusing even if you know the story. It added elements that don't make any sense nor added anything to the overall narrative. Isaac is probably a homeschool kid of one of the producers, because he's as white as my 2 buttcheeks and is a terrible actor. More unnecessary slow motion than any Zack Snyder movie. You can immediately tell who all the bad guys are because of the black eyeliner. The list of negatives go on and on.

Honestly, it's what you'd expect if you gave that one lady in your church a couple thousand dollars to throw a church play. Definitely trying to ride the coattails of the Chosen, and definitely falls flat.

This movie made up elements and left out such important ones. God's covenant with Abraham, God's speaking with and providing for Hagar, the visitation by the Lord and prophecy of Issac's birth in the coming year (when Sarah laughed, giving Issac his name). I would have preferred the story to be told linearly so we could have agonized with Sarah over her infertility, rejoiced at Issac's birth then really felt the gut punch when God tells Abraham to sacrifice his only son. Also I would have liked to have seen more clearly portrayed Abraham's faith in God's promise that Issac would be the seed to generations and therefore God might even resurrect Issac if necessary. (Hebrews 11:17-19). The movie fell short of my expectations, but I'm glad it has spoken to so many. Hopefully the director will consider sticking more closely to scripture in his future endeavors.

4 stars for being about 40% accurate. Before making the movie, they should have read Genesis first. They got the basics of the story in there, so congrats I guess. However, this was a very dark, dreary and depressing adaptation of events, polluted with fictionalized (even darker) side stories that made no sense. And straying from the true timeline of Genesis, Sarah looked about age 40 and Abraham 50 at the time of Isaacs' birth. Not too impressive as far as miracles go. Did the writers of this story think a 90 and 100 year old Sarah and Abraham respectively was too far fetched (even for God)? And the Abraham and Sarah portrayed in this story looked like filthy Neanderthals with face tattoos and lived like dirt poor vagabonds. The Abraham and Sarah of the Bible were blessed by God, who prospered them with wealth, land, cattle, and many hired servants. Abraham was a patriarch and founder of a great nation. This was a very bleak portrayal of a great man of God and inaccurate, underwhelming vision of what is one of the most powerful stories of faith in the Scriptures.

It is easy to get your hopes up for a Christian based movie to make as powerful an impact as the Chosen has.

That said, I love the story, most of the actors are very stiff.

Abraham is far too stoic for a man who hears the voice of God.

The artistic license of the journey to the mountain is somewhat interesting.

The movie does not inspire me to grow closer to God. The sermons I hear from an everyday minister are more inspiring.

I didn't hate the movie because I'm happy that there is still a chance that it touches someone's heart and changes their life.

I am happy to have Christian based content available for my family. My grandchildren were bored in the first ten minutes.

When they watched the Chosen they were glued to the screen.

While is is unfair to compare the two, that is exactly what I find myself doing.

I finally had a chance to see this and I liked it. Is it a great film that can be ranked among the great film makers? No. The pacing is poor, the structure isn't great and some of the acting... well is amateurish. But consider the fact that this is the producer, writer directors first major film. So I'll give him a break there. The visuals are stunning. The actress playing Sara really brings it, and delivers a great performance. The actor playing Abraham, knows about one expression it seems. While this story plays out in a few pages in Genesis, it would be a challenge to stretch that material out for an entire feature film. So there was some filler that does not appear in the bible it does not add or detract from the story fortunately. There was plenty of emotion to be found and I did find the film up lifting. Give it a chance.