My review of “Heaven is for Real” My (Deacon Greg Kandra) review of “Heaven is for Real”

Enjoying a rare day off following the Triduum marathon, I took my wife to see “Heaven is for Real” at a Monday matinee.

I’ll be honest with you: I wasn’t expecting much. The result could have been awful, a preachy mess. The fact that it isn’t—in fact, a lot of it is awfully satisfying—is a testament to the good taste and storytelling skills of Randall Wallace, the director who shepherded this best-selling book from the page to the screen. Wallace knows his way around big stories with inspirational themes; he wrote “Braveheart” and directed “We Were Soldiers” and “Secretariat.” He has given this true-life story of four-year-old Colton Burpo’s journey to heaven something remarkable: he’s made the implausible plausible, and transformed what might have been a treacly Lifetime melodrama into an altogether engaging and even inspiring tale of resilience, struggle, community and faith.

If the story is extraordinary, it becomes believable because of the ordinary—and that is the secret of the film’s success.

The first 45 minutes or so are devoted to the mundane episodes of family life. We meet Todd Burpo—contractor, volunteer firefighter and part-time Protestant minister in the unending flatness of Imperial, Nebraska—and get to know his wife and two small children and the town they call home. Wallace manages to keep all this real and interesting and believable, which makes Colton’s near-death experience after a bout with appendicitis all the more surprising and involving. The boy’s parents are as skeptical as anyone, and you see Todd wrestling with demons of doubt; at one point, he rails at God and can’t quite comprehend what has happened to his life. Also, the depiction of home life is one of cluttered hallways, sick children, unpaid bills, and the stress inherent in any marriage tied to church ministry. (Deacons and their families will find a lot that is very familiar here, I think.)

The movie is also very good at showing both the cohesion and tension that exist in a close-knit community. When Colton’s life is hanging in the balance, his mother picks up the phone and begins calling friends, family, neighbors, anyone—and the movie then shows the widening circle of prayer that embraces the Burpo family and the people in Todd’s congregation. It’s one of the most affecting moments in the movie—in part because, by this point, Wallace has made us really care for the Burpos. (It doesn’t hurt that Greg Kinnear and Kelly Reilly play the parents with a chemistry that carries just enough sizzle and snap. When a fire alarm interrupts an intimate moment, Todd tells his wife, “I have to go put out a fire. I’ll put out this one when I get back.”) Once people in the town get wind of Colton’s story, they’re incredulous, even cynical. That helps give the movie some much-needed grit.

When the movie clings to what is real and tangible and recognizable, it clicks; it’s when it journeys with little Colton to heaven that it runs off the rails.

Some things, I think, are best left to the imagination, and that includes cinematic renderings of Paradise, a place that here isn’t quite as inviting or beautiful as you might expect. It looks like a suburban backyard; evidently, they have a lot of gifted groundskeepers who take care of the grass. Jesus wears a nicely laundered kaftan. You don’t see his face (though you do hear his voice—which, for once, doesn’t have a British accent) and you do glimpse a rendering of the Son of God created by a girl in Lithuania who had an experience similar to Colton’s. The presence of singing, giggling angels, depicted as gauzy winged creatures fluttering across an azure sky, doesn’t really add much, either.

But as much as this is the story of Colton’s journey to heaven and back, it’s also about his father’s journey to doubt and back. The son is saved and so, in a way, is the father. This is what makes the movie so gripping and engrossing. (However, more than once, I had to wonder if Todd, on hearing his son’s incredible descriptions of the afterlife, wasn’t just imagining angels but also envisioning movie and book deals…but I digress.)

I came away from “Heaven is for Real” believing that heaven is for real—but I didn’t need persuading to begin with. I imagine it will be that way for most viewers, many of whom have embraced the book and are eager to see it reflected on the screen. They won’t be disappointed.

And in a movie marketplace teeming with big, loud, violent, shrill blockbusters, it’s a blessing to be able to take in a movie that isn’t aiming to bust blocks, but touch hearts.

“Heaven is for Real” does that. For moviegoers craving stories that uplift and inspire, this movie may be an answered prayer.

Haven't seen the movie yet.

Sounds like a dominating theme of the movie is this angst of the Dad. I didn't get that from the book, but maybe I just missed it. I was more enthralled with how this little guy kept on being regular little guy and every so ofter would just off-highhandedly say something to his mom or dad that to him seemed normal enough to him, but not to Mom and Dad (of course).

What I got from the book was more that they transitioned from incredulousness to belief that this actually happened to their son. That journey and interspersed with what the boy said was a delight to the reader. But it didn't come across like the foundations of Mom & Dad's faith in God were being shaken either. Also, the little guy didn't come across as worried about any of this stuff - he just came across like a happy little guy.

Wonder if the movie shows it this way. Why do I get an impression that the dad is just a little too shook up and the kid is a little too dramatic? That would seem like Hollywood, but doesn't hit the reality I got from the book.

I saw this movie Saturday night, and while I had some problems with it, the depictions of Heaven were not one of them. Pastor Burppo's doubts of not the description of Heaven, but the REALITY of Heaven were a major part of the last half of the film. This struck me as device to stretch the movie. (This was, at best a 40 minute film and they got it to 1:39.) I mean, if your pastor, the leader of the flock, has doubts so deep about the existence of Heaven that he consults a VERY secular doctor to decide if his son has mental problems or not, is not likely to be the guy that can lead his flock to the Promised Land. Leading members of his church have the same problems with this four year old's assertion the Heaven is for real. Fortunately for the movie, the child comes through with the proof, and the film ends on a happy note.

NB. I did NOT read the book, and perhaps he addressed my quibbles there.

Bottom line: See the movie, but don't expect to be bowled over.

Saw it on Sunday, all of my reservations were for naught. It was well done and completely Christian.

for me the bet part was that there were no "villains." There was simply a group of people trying to do the best they could do in a number of difficult situations and trying to live a fully Christian life.

The noise you hear next will be:

1) Protestant wailing and gnashing of teeth.

2) Those that have their eyes shut, hands over their ears and saying "I can't hear you LALALA" over and over.

3) Those sitting tucked in a corner in the fetal position whimpering "It can't be true the Catholics can't be right about anything."

Right on. Schmalzy is how I thought of the supernatural scenes. But then, I thought. what would heaven look like to a four-year old boy? Would it not look like the things he has actually experienced—except prettier? When God speaks through a human agent, he uses the tools in hand. The boy has only the language he has mastered to describe what he has experienced. Do we expect the imagery of a John of the Cross?

Whom would you ask to explain a vision? Someone who can given you a “scientific” explanation of an uncanny event. Because an encounter with the divine is an event that shakes the ground underneath you. I would must rather have a natural explanation of such an encounter than have to change the comfortable distance I have put between me and God.

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