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.
After you have received the RESTORED Gospel, then you get to 'show love' to the Fancher party survivors, by 'adopting' their recently orphaned children!
Are you hot in the busom?
Handwave ALERT!
Those are three of the possibilities.
?
It must be 'shoot the messenger' time!
WACO...
Janet Reno...
What REALLY happened?
WHO is REALLY responsible?
Let's see the LDS spin on THIS 'prediction' on Sept 12th!!!
I can see a BIG new hit TV program that originates in SLC, similar to the big Deal - or NO Deal?:
Prophet, or NO Prophet?
or SACRED??
And it’s ridiculous to think an indie film depicting one of the darkest and most controversial events in CHRISTIAN history could attract SO much attention and get people saved by seeing it!
(Thanks Mel Gibson!)
And it’s ridiculous to think an indie film depicting one of the darkest and most controversial events in CHRISTIAN history could attract SO much attention and get people saved by seeing it!
(Thanks Mel Gibson!)
Romney was in town (Indianapolis) yesterday, along with Huckabee and Thompson.
I found this out after the ~ 3 minute video on channel 13 about FRED!
The lady said the the other two were also in town.
Nope. It’s on the north side of the Escalante River, between the town of Escalante and Calf Creek. Very neat place, but not for beginners.
“For some of us the real story is the loss of innocent American life at the hands of murderers.”
- In that case, you must be looking forward to Hollywood’s release of “Waco” sometime soon - but don’t hold your breath.
“I’m not the one defending an extermination order.”
You sure are buddy. You conveniently forget that the first ‘extermination order’ was issued by Sydney Rigdon, Smith’s right hand man, to the Mormon Danite vigilante group BEFORE Governor Bogg’s counterbalancing order. And you conveniently forget to say that the 10,000 Missouri State Militia surrounding 1000 Mormons at Far West stood down the moment Joseph Smith and his leadership henchmen were given up, hardly the actions of people bent on extermination for no reason.
Now if you want someone on an extermination path, you might look to your Mormon friends during this period. Joseph Smith was hell for leather riding with 200 men to exterminate a bunch of people in Jackson County and was only kept from that path by a bout of cholera. And Smith’s Danites sure weren’t all about having a slumber party. Then at Nauvoo, you miss completely the point that had Smith survived, he would have gone on an extermination raiding party with his Legion.
So, because you are as ignorant as a post about the history, you are willing to completely overlook the sins of one side just so you can throw some Holier than Thou insults at me. I note you never quote any original documents from the era to back up your points, is this because you are lazy or because you just don’t care about the truth?
“And no, I don’t think its an extreme example, because if the Mormons had stayed in Missouri, thats exactly what would have happened. If the Mormons were so powerful, why didn’t they stay and fight off the mobbers?”
The mobbers you say? I believe that is quite an insult, because what you are really saying is “those damn Gentiles”. Mobbers is a Mormon codeword for anyone who opposed them for any reason. Now I understand, you are just a Mormon apologist, Mormons are right no matter what thery do. Blood Atonement anyone? Some moral standard that is, the three monkeys standard, deaf dumb and blind to evil on their own side of the tracks.
Well you can go pray to the crazy crystal gazer/tinpot general/ prophet/ king/ exterminator Joseph Smith all you want, but count me out.
And cut the “exterminating the Jews” crap. The Jews didn’t have a king, they didn’t have an army and they weren’t threatening secession, so they were persecuted strictly for religious reasons.
Smith had run a bank swindle, raised two armies plus a posse, had set up a shadow government and was attempting to carve out a terrestrial kingdom - he was a threat to civil society the same as a Jim Jones. If there had been a real desire to exterminate the Mormons, they would no longer exist. Their being pushed from place to place is certainly lamentable and cruel, but blame can be put on the ulterior designs of the early Mormon leadership for raw power. Even the Jews were not treated this way, so you need to ask yourself, what were the Mormons doing that so incensed everone else? It wasn’t baking cookies I can tell you.
Where does this loathing come from FC? It’s affecting your rational thinking.
Your postings are the best short history course I have read in a long while, you are doing a great job of conveying the feel of the times, and context for the events. Thanks, I think you are making many of us want to look deeper into the roots of this group.
“In that case, you must be looking forward to Hollywood’s release of “Waco” sometime soon - but don’t hold your breath.”
I know, even though this happened right in front of us, somehow the victims remained just strangers in the background.
“Where does this loathing come from FC? It’s affecting your rational thinking.”
I don’t loathe anyone, but I do question why Joseph Smith loathed the Gentiles so much that he set up a shadow government and built a militia to battle them. Now the thing is, I haven’t seen any of you post a single document to refute what I’ve been saying about Joseph Smith.
There are a number of you who are “out to get me” and there is no end to the vile things you all accuse me of - all for pointing out what a nasty piece of work Joseph Smith was.
But here’s the thing, I can now go back through my posting record for hundreds of posts and I see not a single citation from your side that refutes what I’ve been saying.
To me that speaks volumes about what a vacuum exists in your heads. I think it is clear you all are the true haters, haters of truth and haters of anyone who would point to the evidence.
In contrast, I’ve posted multiple books worth of documentation from eyewitnesses at Gallatin whose property was being pillaged by Danites on a rampage, from the constable of Kirtland who testified what a rabble rouser Smith was, from Reed Peck who helped save the Mormons from annihilation because of Smith’s death wish, from the Nauvoo Expositor that outlines Smith’s embezzling, wife stealing and land speculation; from the Pennsylvania Republican that outlines the Kirtland and Monroe bank ponzi schemes; and from so many other sources.
And what do you guys present? Nada, squat, zilch, zippo! Just a lot of name calling directed at me because you haven’t got diddly to refute me.
Why, I have more material that goes against me than you do!
So until you people start posting something substantive rather than just more slobbering name calling, I will be able to continue to beat the bejesus out of your tinpot/polygamist/king/prophet/crystal gazer/charlatan/God. And you can keep crying like little girls about how unfair it is that someone actually bothers to go back and research what actually happened from the source documents you are too lazy to read yourself, because you will never learn.
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