Review: Tonal flips test ‘Faith of Our Fathers’
The discovery of a box containing the hand-written correspondence from Vietnam of a young man’s late father serves as a truth-seeking link to the past for his devout Christian son in “Faith of Our Fathers,” a dramatically DOA road movie by actor and faith-based filmmaker Carey Scott.
Determined to get answers to the in-the-line-of-duty death of his Beatles-fan dad, John Paul George (co-screenwriter Kevin Downes) embarks on a road trip to the Wall in Washington, D.C., accompanied by a gruff non-believer (David A.R. White, doing his best Nick Nolte), whose cynical father also served in the war.
Timed to coincide with the 50th anniversary of America’s involvement in the Vietnam conflict, the dramedy flip-flops between the decidedly sitcom-y present and stilted battlefield settings that feature a less-than-commanding Stephen Baldwin as a solemn U.S. sergeant.
It should come as no surprise that those two tonally incompatible modes fail to find any sort of common ground in a production that makes no attempt to bridge wacky character cameos with such affirmations as “I have a heavenly father who loves me more than an earthly father ever could.”
This evangelical “Dear America: Letters Home From Vietnam” by way of “The Dukes of Hazzard” takes a mighty ridiculous route to righteousness.
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‘Faith of Our Fathers’
MPAA rating: PG-13, for brief war violence
Running time: 1 hour, 36 minutes
Playing: In general release
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