Cuckoo for Jesus in satire 'Saved!'

By Rene Rodriguez
Knight Ridder Newspapers

SAVED! PG-13 Rating: 2 stars A United Artists release. Running time: 92 minutes. Vulgar language, sexual situations, adult themes.

In "Saved!," everyone is cuckoo for Jesus — and acting cuckoo because of it. The virginal Mary (Jena Malone), heeding what she believes to be Jesus' personal advice, sleeps with her boyfriend Dean (Chad Faust) to cure him of his homosexuality (it doesn't work, but Mary winds up pregnant for her effort).

Mary's best friend, the popular and petty Hilary Faye (Mandy Moore, lampooning her squeaky-clean image), runs around school leading prayer circles and impromptu exorcisms, and belting nonbelievers in the back with her Bible. Patrick (Patrick Fugit), the principal's son, has traveled the world as head of the Christian Skateboard Team ("Which part of the world has the most heathens?" Hilary asks him hungrily). Even Mary's widowed mother (Mary-Louise Parker) prides herself on being a "Christian interior decorator."

This might all make "Saved!" sound like a stridently anti-Christian tract — "The Razzing of the Christ" — but it's not. Brian Dannelly, who directed and co-wrote the picture, is not out to lambaste organized religion or spiritual faith of any kind. He even gives Mary a climactic, (and unnecessary) speech that reaffirms her belief in a higher power, just to make sure everyone in the audience gets the message.

The problem with "Saved!," which is often bright and likable, is that its central point — extremism, religious or otherwise, is bad — is too obvious for a satire. "There's no room for moral ambiguity here!" the intolerant Hilary tells anyone who disagrees with her, but the same could be said of the movie. Every character falls in the either/or category: Either they're rigorous zealots blinded by their beliefs, or they're enlightened, accepting souls tolerant of other people's decisions. The film is as black-and-white as the mind-set it criticizes.

Once its premise is established, "Saved!" doesn't have anywhere to go, repetition creeps in, and jokes that might have otherwise been funny ("You're not born a gay; you're born a-`gain'!") start eliciting groans instead. Like the recent "Mean Girls," where the sharp humor was dulled by a cliched story line, "Saved!" also succumbs to the worst kind of high-school formulas, sinking some terrific characters (like Cassandra, the school's goth bad-girl and only Jew, winningly played by Eva Amurri) in a plotline that revolves around yet another prom. Granted, it is an unusually eventful, busy prom. But still, a prom.

Take away the evangelical elements and "Saved!" is just another tale of an adolescent learning to think for herself instead of blindly accepting the beliefs and values handed down to her. But there's no real tension in Mary's coming of age, because her decisions aren't all that difficult. Most curious of all, "Saved!" never really explores the consequences of Mary's pregnancy as anything other than a plot device. Surely, a newborn baby should prove a much more daunting challenge to a high school senior than a group of intolerant Jesus freaks.