Grace Unplugged

Ever so often, an inspirational film comes along to help encourage us to become better people than what we are or believe we are. There is no accident between our society being turned upside down and more of these type of films being produced. A lot of them in just the past ten years have graced our screens, i.e. "Fireproof", "Courageous", "Soul Surfer", "Chasing Mavericks", "Facing the Giants", most recently, "The Ultimate Life", among others. Now we have "Grace Unplugged" to add to that fast growing list.

This is an inspirational/motivational film about an 18 year-old Christian singer/songwriter, Grace Rose Trey (AJ Michalka). Beautiful, highly talented and restless, Grace is far undiscovered outside church. She performs there each Sunday with her gifted father Johnny (James Denton), the praise worship music leader at Freedom Community Chapel, a small town Alabama church. A former rock star, Johnny Trey charted a Billboard number one single 20 years before. When the hits stopped coming, he crash landed hard--a one hit wonder. Johnny subsequently found Christ and a new life for his family, far from the Hollywood Hills. Because of musical differences, one day without warning, Grace leaves for Los Angeles. She talks with Johnny's former manager and producer, Frank "Mossy" Mostin (Kevin Pollack) and lands a record deal from a demo CD he listened to. Mossy sees Grace a potential pop superstar--the next Katie Perry. Cutting off contact with her parents, Grace seems prepared to stray from her Christian life and music to achieve her long-suppressed fantasy of Hollywood, until she meets her affable, awkward, clumsy assistant, Quentin (Michael Welch) who slowly, through their short talks, gets her to rethink. Is this her faith being put to the test or is it just her conscience playing tug of war with her?

Others to round out the cast are Shawnee Smith as Michelle Trey, Johnny's wife, Jamie Grace as Rachael, friend of Grace back home, Emma Catherwood as Kendra Burroughs, Grace's image consultant, Chris Ellis as Pastor Tim Bryant, Pia Toscano as Alyssa, Kelly Thiebaud as Renae Taylor, Zane Holtz as Jay Grayson, an actor, Rob Steinberg as Mark Reynolds, Patricia French as Sally Benson, Anthony Reynolds as Rick, Quentin's dad, Aimee Dunn as Donna, Quentin's mom, and Juan Martinez as Noah.

This was emotional, and well paced by writer and director, Brad J. Silverman, which was based on a story by Silverman, Brandon Rice, and James Killian. If this wasn't considered an inspirational film, this wouldn't have been a great film, because of the fact that it was quite predictable. But since inspirational films are supposed to carry a positive, caring, even spiritual message, this pretty much had to go the predictable route. It can't end up bad or even bittersweet, or be oddly presented since this is to convey a message hopefully in an entertaining way. If it makes one feel better about themselves and others around them, this will have done its job. Well, with the exceptions of very few inconsistencies, this did that for me. I walked in the theater feeling a bit down, but left feeling much better about people and the world, even if it's only temporary.

If you are spiritual, religious, etc., you will certainly get the message here fairly quick, but even if you're not, it might make you think, at least be able to enjoy the incredible voice that AJ Michalka does have. You be the judge.

Out of 4 Stars: 3                            Rated: PG                          102mins.