The R.M. By Kurt Hale Halestorm Entertainment, 2003. Genre: Film
Reviewed by: Chris Bigelow

Well, I went and saw The R.M. on Saturday nite, and then I went home and tossed and turned over how absurd the Mormon culture is and how much I would prefer not to be part of it. That's really the effect the movie had on me. It didn't help that earlier that day I had attended cub scouts for the first time in my new calling, and now I'm even more sure than ever that I have absolutely no interest in trying to "entertrain" other people's wild little kids when I can barely find time and energy to entertrain my own. So depressing absurdity was already on my mind.

When I woke up on Sunday morning, I was sufficiently recovered to attend church and teach elders quorum, but I still think the movie was really depressing. I did get a few laughs out of it, but mostly I thought: Yeah, the movie is pretty much right, Mormonism is often a silly, stupid, absurd culture, what with the food storage and the network marketing and the home teaching and the Sunday lessons, etc. I guess the movie almost did too good a job, on certain levels, of mocking the culture, both purposefully and inadvertently (mostly purposefully).

As far as the actual filmmaking aspects, why does the acting have to be so hammy and exaggerated? And so many of the gags were too overdone and repetitive. As in Singles Ward, I experienced at least two cringes for every laugh. I thought the movie's last 15 minutes or so really fell apart, starting when they got arrested in the stolen car.

Now I'm beginning to understand more how/why people like Richard D. and Eric Sam reacted so strongly against Singles Ward, which for some reason didn't have such a negative effect on me as R.M. did. While its surface is cheesy, obvious humor, I found The R.M. exceptionally dark and depressing, much worse for my Mormon state of mind than some of the Tanner and Godmaker books I've been perusing for another project. Not that I look to movies to affirm my faith, but this one seemed like all ineptitude and mockery with nothing worthwhile to counterbalance it. Somehow that combination of ineptitude and mockery is even more dispiriting than either one operating alone; mockery can be powerful when done intelligently, but when it doesn't come from a solid base it's just depressing. I hope we're not having the same net effect with The Sugar Beet.

Chris Bigelow