A Great Awakening

“A Great Awakening” is a faith-based historical drama that preaches to the choir (quite literally for most of its 129-minute runtime), but for everyone else, it’s a repetitive sermon. The movie is sincere and well-intentioned, but ultimately, like so many movies that deal with religion, it all depends on whether or not you subscribe to its message.

The movie is set before the American Revolution and is supposedly based on the true story of Benjamin Franklin (John Paul Sneed) and his friendship with English preacher George Whitefield (Jonathan Blair).

The movie explains how both men took opposite paths in life from what they originally wanted: Franklin’s father wanted him to be a preacher, but Franklin himself wanted to be a writer. He gets the opportunity to work with his cousin and then later on has his own newspaper, The Pennsylvania Gazette.

Whitefield starts out wanting to be an actor, and during his time at Oxford, he encounters a group called The Holy Club, who are devout Christians, and their passion for both God and humanity inspires him in his journey.

Whitefield becomes obsessed with preaching the Good News despite having a lazy eye, but his desire is anything but lazy. He even risks his own health and safety by preaching at every opportunity. There’s no denying Blair’s conviction in the role, but that’s also his Achilles’ heel. Once he starts on his relentless sermonizing, he’s a complete bore.

The movie does show us how Franklin and Whitefield eventually meet when the latter arrives in Philadelphia to preach, and it’s here that the movie delves deeply into Whitefield’s views on the Gospel, but sadly, we don’t get much insight into the man himself.

Apart from his time on stage, the movie makes no effort to depict his personal life. We don’t know if he is married or has any children. We don’t know what he enjoys besides preaching. We don’t get any other clues about who or what Whitefield was beyond his sermons.

Sneed, as Franklin, is a little more developed and is more interesting than his counterpart. At least the movie shows us a clash of their differing beliefs, as Franklin says he’s a deist, which is opposed to Whitefield’s beliefs, creating a conflict. Sadly, it’s unconvincing because it’s a foregone conclusion about where the movie takes Franklin in his spiritual quest.

A Great Awakening is the sort of film that its evangelical audience will devour with zeal, but its characterization of Whitefield feels handcuffed by the messages to the point where, cinematically, it needs forgiveness.