Chasing Grace

Sometimes you have hope when you pop in a DVD after viewing the trailer and truly look forward to a great movie. Other times, you wind up disappointed, that perhaps the best scenes of said movie were all combined in the trailer. That is the case with Chasing Grace by Catalyst Pictures. Now on DVD courtesy of Word Films, this is the story of one pastor's family and how they handle the grief and loss that comes when their daughter Grace is accidentally shot when she finds the gun her uncle Carter (David Temple) had brought to her birthday party. The uncle was just released from jail by his brother and pastor Jonathan Matheson (Michael Joiner), and had passed out in the family home when the tragedy happened.

Now each member of the family processes their grief in very different ways. Jonathan picks up drinking to bypass the pain same as his brother and father. He tries to hide it from his wife and board members of his church but soon even those lies are brought to lie with very profound circumstances. His wife Angela (Ashlee Payne), buries her feelings in trying to get the family back to normal as quickly as possible which leaves her in dark depression that even counseling can't seem to help. Her two remaining sons, Christopher, the oldest, has to fend off bullies at school and finds solace following in his father's footsteps to see how alcohol might help ease the pain. He soon finds himself in jail. While the youngest, David struggles to understand just what is happening to his family and how he can try to help.

I received Chasing Grace by Catalyst Pictures compliments of Word Films and Edify Media Inc for my honest review. I did not receive any monetary compensation, aside for a free copy of this DVD in exchange for my personal evaluation either favorable or not. I have to say, I was not that impressed. The story line is boring and the pace of the film moves so slowly, you find yourself wondering just how much longer this film can drag the story out. Each character's evolution into grief in so slow paced, you simply wish they'd get it over with, so you can find other things to do. While the run time on this is 96 minutes, anything longer than a hour is beyond brutal. I had to keep trying to find a way to convince myself to finish this in order to see how it might all end up. You have a pastor trying to convince and manipulate the local police to take vengeance on his brother in any viable means possible even killing him if need be. While I understand processing grief is different for everyone, I think the point of finding forgiveness is so missing until the final moments, that most people would turn it off before getting that far. These are not characters you feel any kind of connection with and therefore are missing that factor of wanting to know how it all turns out for any of them. For me, this one was a 3 out of 5 stars in my opinion, and even that might be a bit generous. This is just my opinion but others might have a different one than what I posted here.

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Chasing Grace by Catalyst Pictures and Word Films

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