sandramac101

I have watched this film twice. I appreciated the acting and the technical quality of the production, and would recommend the film for that reason. However, like so many moralistic films, the singer and musician failed his true calling in life, and ultimately renounced the life that brought him briefly to sin, but also could have brought him closer to the wisdom he sought through sharing his life's lesson. It made him a one-trick pony, and his wife only wanted him if he just stayed on her father's vineyard to work, renouncing his musical talent because "she didn't know anything about such things."

Whenever a film makes either the man's or the woman's work, which supports the family, appear only sinful and even harmful to the family, it makes me angry, as a wife and as a Christian. Yes, it caused him to sin, but so did his wife's inability to show him love and appreciation when he came off the road and home to her. It is part of what made him fall from grace - he had asked her to come with him on the road with their son, and she said she never would.

I would have been far more supportive of the film if he had fallen, rediscovered God's love and purpose in redemption through Christ, and taken that new understanding into his music, to inspire others. As it was, the movie gave out a lot of Old Testament platitudes in the narrative, and lost a great opportunity to demonstrate growth in both the characters of the husband and wife. So, watch it for the scenery, and the bits of good music, or as a cautionary tale, but don't look for answers in the lives of its lead characters.