Posted on 08/23/2007 5:45:11 PM PDT by Reaganesque
"This handsome indie Western damningly recounts the 1857 slayings of 120 settlers passing through Utah, but the didactic presentation, grim speechifying and tacked-on love story all signify a less-than-healthy regard for the audience's intelligence."
Variety Justin Chang
1/4 "The film feels less like historical drama than a venomous religious tract printed on celluloid." Minneapolis Star Tribune Colin Covert
"September Dawn has the ham-fisted lyricism of political ads and pharmaceutical commercials." Village Voice J. Hoberman
"When the movie isn't doling out ham-fisted history...it gives us magnificent vistas of a pristine prairie...and there's a deep sweetness to the subplot of Jonathan and Emily falling in love." Film Journal International Frank Lovece
1.5/4 "When watching the screen depiction of a historic event in which 120 people were murdered, giggling is not the appropriate response." Salt Lake Tribune Sean Means
1/5 "It has the chilling certitude of the self-righteous." Orlando Sentinel Roger Moore
2.5/5 "The real problem is that September Dawn isn't a very good movie. It moves too much like a public-school history pageant and gives us mono-dimensional characters who speak dialogue that fairly reeks of printer's ink." Arizona Republic Richard Nilsen
1/5 "The jarring MTV-style filmmaking is so distracting and the 'messaging' so unsubtle that after two long hours you find yourself leaving the theater with a massive headache, wondering when you started to hate Mormons." Orlando Weekly Brett Register
1/4 "Forget Grindhouse. September Dawn is the year's first honest-to-goodness exploitation flick." Slant Magazine Nick Schager
1/4 "Bombastic, slow-drying dramatization with lead-weight dialogue and a turgid romantic subplot." Newsday Gene Seymour
D- "Has serious problems in historical terms. But in this case they're exacerbated by the simple ineptitude of the filmmaking." One Guy's Opinion Frank Swietek
"Even if one gets past the movie's controversial depictions, there is the matter of its second-rate, made-for-television fare -- the poor battle choreography, the wooden editing and the cheesy writing." Washington Post Desson Thomson
2.5/4 "If September Dawn is a kind of Western, it's a Western utterly devoid of heroism or the usual archetypes. But the core message transcends time: Hatred laced with religious fanaticism is a toxic blend." Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Dave Tianen
1/4 "Doesn't even measure up to an episode of your typical, cowboy TV show from the Fifties like Roy Rogers or The Lone Ranger. Get my drift, Kimosabe?" NewsBlaze Kam Williams
Click here for links to the full reviews.
Ping!
Condolences Ping!
Two different reviewers using the term “ham fisted” at the same time. Odd.
It is sad to read with such a tragic subject that would be mention of giggles!
It might be a hamfisted movie but the historical facts are not in doubt.
Here’s a third ham-fisted,
“But the pic is ultimately less interested in understanding its Mormon characters than in demonizing them, and a ham-fisted obviousness undermines scene after scene”
http://www.variety.com/review/VE1117934474.html?categoryid=31&cs=1&nid=2562
So you saw the movie please share with us!
They didn’t even try to disguise the real motivation for the movie.
“Here’s a third ham-fisted,”
Somebody put out a talking points list.
No. I’m aware of the massacre though. Books, the forgotten media.
Every religion, when scrutinized by a skeptic, is open to mockery. Tune in to South Park if you want satire that ridicules, sect by sect, all comers in the world of religious zealots especially Mormons.
But September Dawn isn't mockery. It's practically a call to jihad.
We can probably count the days until this shows up for sale on fringe Christian TV channels, its virtues trumpeted by some minister or other marketing his or her version of "The Truth."
There are facts here. It's thought-provoking in the ways it makes you consider how this event resembles that later 9/11.
But there's the unmistakable air of evil about this enterprise, and not just an atrocity the Mormon church caused to happen 150 years ago.
Psst! Stop using “ham fisted”. They are on to us!
I’ve been called a ham-fisted dirt mechanic before.
3 ham-fisted reviews? Starting to sound less like coincidence and more like plagarism (the stupid theory) or collusiion (the conspiracy theory).
Hmmm.
Heh heh. It’s real funny when the Christians complain about anyone else’s history of blood and corpses. Pot meet kettle.
Then there’s the mountains of corpses from the last century created by the liberals’ favorite political philosophy. These lefty movie makers should really shut up about these things.
Oh, and I’m not a Mormon.
Stop it already, you're making me hungry.
What you said.
So all the critics hate it? Sounds like a movie I’ll like.
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