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THE R.M.

What You Need To Know:

THE R.M. is a comedy about a young man who stumbles into a funny series of mishaps and dead-end jobs after serving a two-year stint as a Mormon missionary. Despite an appealing, sympathetic protagonist, the movie is overlong and preaches a religious worldview and church organization contrary to what Jesus Christ and His disciples teach in the New Testament.

Content:

(FRFRFR, AbAb, V, AA, M) False Mormon worldview, which mimics Christianity but is really polytheistic, works oriented and non-historical with a surprising degree of ridicule regarding male lay leaders in a religious organization; no foul language; some comical, slapstick violence such as sprinklers unexpectedly turn on and drench young man in a suit, bunk bed with heavyset man lying on it falls on much skinnier man, man on ladder falls backward, and man accidentally steps on cat; no implied or depicted sex scenes, but protagonist’s best friend is a playboy at college; no nudity; implied alcohol use and drunkenness; no smoking; and, lying rebuked.

GENRE: Comedy

FRFRFR

AbAb

V

AA

M

More Detail:

THE R.M. is a Mormon comedy that played regionally in the first half of 2003 and will soon be out on video. Despite an appealing, sympathetic protagonist, a tighter storyline and less earnest tone would have improved this overlong exercise immensely.

The movie opens with high school graduate Jared Phelps setting out on his two-year stint as a traveling Mormon missionary, leaving behind his family, his girlfriend Julie, and his best friend Kori. Two years later, Jared unexpectedly returns to find that his parents have moved and sold his car, his girlfriend is engaged to another guy, his best friend has turned into a playboy at Brigham Young University, and his boss has sold the company, meaning that Jared has no job. A series of accidents, dead-end jobs and other mishaps has Jared wondering, Where’s the blessing that the Mormon church promised would be his after serving his two-year missionary tour?

Kirby Heyborne does an excellent job as the beleaguered former missionary, Jared, who’s now expected to take a leadership role among the men in the church. The filmmakers have derived some funny situations for Jared to stumble into as he searches for his place in the community. The movie wears out its welcome after awhile, however.

In some ways, THE R.M. is an anti-Mormon movie, because it shows a church riddled with an ineffectual, authoritarian leadership and a flock of people, especially the men in the congregation, who are surprisingly uninvolved in the duties required of them by the church hierarchy. Although the protagonist concludes that his blessings come from the family and friends around him, it’s really not clear that Jared has been blessed at all by anything or anyone, including God.

Of course, the god of Mormonism is not the same God as the God in the Bible, and the sanctification of sinful human beings in Mormonism has more in common with the “enlightenment” and deification of human beings in Buddhism than it does to the sanctification of sinful human beings described by Jesus and His disciples in the New Testament. The works and humanistic orientation of the church in THE R.M. also seems woefully inadequate when compared to the salvation offered us through the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the Grace of God in Christianity. For example, when Jared comes home from his missionary activities, he declares, “I’m home. I’m worthy,” which apparently describes the status he attains for doing his two-year missionary tour of duty. In contrast to this, in the New Testament, God declares us worthy and righteous because of our faith in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. If our own works have anything to do with our salvation, then Jesus died in vain.

Please address your comments to:

Kurt Hale

HaleStorm Entertainment

www.halestormentertainment.com

SUMMARY: THE R.M. is a comedy about a young man who stumbles into a funny series of mishaps and dead-end jobs after serving a two-year stint as a Mormon missionary. Despite an appealing, sympathetic protagonist, the movie is overlong and preaches a religious worldview and church organization contrary to what Jesus Christ and His disciples teach in the New Testament.

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Now more than ever we’re bombarded by darkness in media, movies, and TV. Movieguide® has fought back for almost 40 years, working within Hollywood to propel uplifting and positive content. We’re proud to say we’ve collaborated with some of the top industry players to influence and redeem entertainment for Jesus. Still, the most influential person in Hollywood is you. The viewer.

What you listen to, watch, and read has power. Movieguide® wants to give you the resources to empower the good and the beautiful. But we can’t do it alone. We need your support.

You can make a difference with as little as $7. It takes only a moment. If you can, consider supporting our ministry with a monthly gift. Thank you.

Movieguide® is a 501c3 and all donations are tax deductible.