It's kind of hard to believe that this movie had four writers. You would think that one of them would point out that this kind of story had already been done before, but I guess this is the kind of thing you should expect when you produce a script by committee. The movie is a homogenized and bland imagining based on a documentary of the same name.
The story is about Emma Greenwell's character and her attempt to find her sister who contacted her and said she needed help. To this end, Emma manages to get Brendan McCarthy to give her a ride to the church in the middle of nowhere where her sister was last seen. When they get there, they find the charismatic Brendan McCarthy as Brother Billy. I don't think there is any time in the movie where the audience is comfortable with the church people and Brother Billy to the point that they would be fooled into thinking that there was nothing evil or wrong going on. I suppose it's okay to have a clearly defined enemy to go up against, but there is none of the suspense that is really needed.
All of the actors do a passable job acting. Some are better than others, but let's not bicker and argue about who was better than who. Not a whole lot was called for from most of them - all of the people at the commune were supposed to be pretty demure and slightly annoying. Brother Billy is the biggest character, and I really don't know how he did, as his hair was so distracting in every scene that his words kind of became background. Well, I was also distracted trying to figure out how they managed to have enough income to pay for electricity and all of the other necessities of life.
I will admit that the audience gets involved at times with utterances of, "What the hell?" and "Why would they do that?" and "Just shoot him. Why does no one listen to me when I say to shoot? Just shoot him in the face, and you've solved your problem. It's pretty obvious that you're justified in this situation, so just do it!" It's possible that it was just ME shouting that, but I know someone near me was saying it, and I agreed with everything that brilliant and handsome man said.
Directing was good
Story was very, very weak
Dialog was jerky and awkward
Acting was good
Cinematography was very weak, as they picked a great location and had few good shots of it.
1.5/5