A Rewatching of God's Army

Today we watched the film "God's Army" with the kids. They'd never seen it because - VHS. I hadn't seen it in years. However, I had much the experience I did when I saw it in the theater in Provo 16 years ago. I actually really like it and find that it relates very much to my own experiences as a missionary. Not all of it is realistic - the newest elder being picked up at the airport in a VW bus or the mission president without a suit jacket reaming out the brand new elder in a cluttered office or the baptisms in the ocean - but a lot of the characters and scenes in the movie ring true. It gets a little over the top towards the end but I guess you need some of that for drama's sake.

I did a little reading about Richard Dutcher afterwards. Much of the movie was autobiographical, from the troubled family life of the young elder to the spiritual experience in Carthage Jail of the black elder. He put everything he had into producing a movie depicting a story unique to the Mormon faith. I was aware that he had become disenchanted with the direction the Mormon film genre took in the years following the release of God's Army, and that his planned biopic of the prophet Joseph Smith never got off the ground.

Apparently he left the church in 2007 amidst doubts about the truthfulness of the LDS church. It seems ironic that God's Army became autobiographical in another sense for Dutcher after he lost his faith. One of the elders in the movie struggles with doubts as he becomes consumed with anti-Mormon literature. Some of the most powerful scenes in the film are when Dutcher's character confronts this elder about his behavior. He yells at him in a diner about trusting in the works of those who devote their time and energy to destroying the faith of other people and exhorts him to spend more time studying the church's material. Later he topples over a table in their apartment in a fit of rage after discovering that the elder finally gave in and deserted his mission.

So while many of the aspects of Dutcher's early life were portrayed in the more heroic characters in the movie, isn't it interesting that ultimately he became most like the faithless missionary in the film?