I’ve been a big fan of Richard Dutcher over the years. I loved God’s Army, Brigham City, and States of Grace. I loved that his films took Mormonism seriously. His films were touching, thoughtful, and spiritual. I found great value in his presentations of Mormon spirituality, and dealing with life in a complex world. When Richard Dutcher resigned from the LDS church, I was still a fan, and hoped that he might change his mind someday. But even if he didn’t, I still want to be a fan.
Dan Wotherspoon did a 5 or so hour-long interview for Mormon Stories. I am such a fan, I listened to all 5 parts of the interview. I learned that Richard is producing a new film called Triptych. (Here’s a preview.) He has been seeking funding to finish filming, and I considered donating. (Fundraising ended earlier this week.) The film is basically 3 short films. Part 1 sounds really good–a boy in a city takes care of dead animals, giving them a proper burial. Part 2 is a story about a minister who lost his/her faith and tries to find it again. Part 3 tells about a woman whose faith is a source of pain, seeking to compensate by “unconventional ways.” Something strikes me a bit odd about Part 3, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to donate to the film without understand a bit more about the “unconventional ways.”
So, this week Richard Dutcher sent out a message about a screening of another of his films called Evil Angel at the Salty Horror International Film Festival here in Salt Lake City. I really wanted to go–Dutcher would be there to answer questions after, and film festivals are fun to go to. Since I’m Facebook friends with Richard, he invited me (and his 1600 friends) to attend. The screening was last Thursday in Salt Lake City.
I decided to look for a trailer to learn more about the movie. I have to warn you that I did a Google search, and discovered that evil angel dot com is a porn site, so don’t go there unless you’re looking for porn. But I did find the trailer, as well as an interview of Richard Dutcher on Youtube about the movie Evil Angel as well. I was impressed that Ving Rhames (the black guy with sunglasses in this Mission Impossible trailer) is in the film. I was intrigued to learn that the film had a biblical context: the story of Lilith, Adam’s wife prior to Eve. I’ve been intending to post more of the story of this [alleged] woman before Eve, but haven’t fully researched it yet so I’ve been holding off. I thought Dutcher’s film might be some good research for me. However, while Dutcher uses this semi-biblical story, it is more of a blood and gore serial killer movie. Lilith, spurned by Adam, is taking revenge on the entire human race. There does appear to be some gratuitous sex and a tremendous amount of bloody violence. The trailer appears to have an R rating, though I believe the film is unrated at this time.
I have enjoyed some horror films, but it is not my interest. For example, I liked Se7en (Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman), and the Blair Witch Project, but these are the exceptions, rather than the rule. After viewing the trailer for Evil Angel (you can see it here), I decided against going to watch it, and decided I was glad I did not contribute to Triptych because I don’t know if I am interested in supporting this kind of cinema. But see for yourself, and check out Dutcher’s interview on YouTube.
So, I did some more research on Dutcher. His other recent film is sort of a semi-autobiographical film called Falling. He marketed it here in Utah as the “first R-rated Mormon film.” I thought that was a terrible marketing ploy. Still I wanted to see it, but never did. This interview at Cinema Scope describes it a bit with Richard Dutcher as the lead character (named Eric), wondering if he has wasted his life. Ok, I get that, and it sounds like it could be interesting, but the real problem I have with the film is what I have heard about the film. Quoting from the interview,
This is Dutcher’s most painfully, even extravagantly agnostic film: a pivotal moment even features [main character] Eric [played by Dutcher] lobbing f-bombs at the Man Upstairs. A grim work of gutbucket artistry, Falling is a masterfully controlled atrocity exhibition that, like its protagonist, eventually flies into a million pieces: one can practically see the blood and sweat, the physical force pushing light through the celluloid in the effort to grab hold of something in a spiritually rudderless world.
This description is making me glad I didn’t see the film. I am really impressed with Dutcher’s first 3 Mormon films, but these last 3 really leave me scratching my head. I know he wants to make a film on the life of Joseph Smith. I want him to make that film, and if he treats the subject matter with the same insightful spirituality of the 3 films I liked, I still would donate to the cause. But I’m really scratching my head with these last 3 films here. What are we supposed to think of Richard Dutcher?
Wheat & Tares 
Evil Angel I think was mostly a business decision as I understand it, although I think he said wanted to make a decent horror movie, better than a lot of the cheap stuff out there. Horror is not really my thing anyway, but I hope it does well so he can make the JS movie, although I’m trying not to have high expectations for either the film or its reception. I’d love to see a rough stone rolling-ish JS on film, one that I cam recommend to nonmembers as something I think is representative of my thoughts, but we’ll see how it turns out. I don’t think it’s going to be as bad as some of the JS movies that leave out things as important as polygamy.
I liked God’s Army. It still wasn’t good enough for me to watch his other films, though I hear Brigham City was pretty good.
As for Richard Dutcher? My testimony won’t be affected by his choices in life and his choices in film. If he makes quality films I’ll see them. If they have a Mormon feel to them, that’s great. He should consider adapting a story to film.
My favorite Dutcher film is Brigham City. I found the conflicted bishop a believable character and the love of his ward members for him was most touching.
I haven’t seen any of his darker films. I doubt that he’ll ever finish the JS film. Joseph Smith is too complex to put into a movie. Believers cannot depict his life factually and non-believers can’t view him with any sympathy.
I agree about the difficulty of a good JS movie. The prophecy of “good and bad” being spoken of him seems to mean that no one can tell his story neutrally. Either he’s a craven sociopathic money-grubbing pedophile or “praise to the man who communed with Jehovah.” No middle ground. I’d like to see a more realistic portrayal also, in which he is sincere, but flawed.
Richard Dutcher, meh. I thought God’s Army was a bit emotionally manipulative (when he doesn’t take his medication so the guy will get baptized, for example). Brigham City seemed not quite groundbreaking enough for the murder mystery genre – overall, it seemed a bit uneven. Definitely the best LDS filmmaker, but that’s an incredibly low bar. And he’s pretty much lost it, IMHO.
It’s one of the problems with mixing LDS with art. The result is either treacly or leads to disaffection and atheism. In this case, a bit of both.
I was never that impressed with Dutcher. For LDS films, I liked “The Other Side of Heaven” best. I think the genre died though.
I am much more worried about what happened to George Lucas than to Richard Dutcher. He’s smashed Willow with terrible book sequals, screwed up star wars, and only did mediocre on Indiana Jones.
I never enjoyed any of his films, to be honest. In light of the short stint of awful LDS “comedy” (Singles Ward?), I do agree with MH that I at least appreciated Dutchers attempt at taking Mormonism serious in his films. Still, they were strictly a Mormon novelty in that it was one of the first times that Mormonism made its way into film as the centerpiece, where the effort wasn’t directly funded/commissioned by the Church proper. The acting and content wasn’t all that great, but for a short time we had more foot into establishing an insulated pseudo Mormon pop-culture.
I think part of the problem with Dutchers reputation however, comes from the way he is percieved. At a personal level his spiritual transition may not have been as abrubt as his filmography would suggest. He spent the first half of this decade making Mormon faithful films like God’s Army and Handcart, and then veers hard left into some very Mormon-unfriendly territory. There has been a ton of speculation on what his “true” motives were, ie, he was too prideful and wanted to live a “hollywood lifestyle”, etc. None of us know – but even for a non-believer like me, the perception of how he zipped from extreme to extreme conjurs a “what-the-heck” kind of gut reaction that overshadows a natural tendency to try and take him serious. Possibly my fault, but I would bet that’s largely what drives the various Dutcher polarities.
What are we to make? I suppose the same thing we’d make of anyone who goes through transformations on a public stage. Granted, Dutcher’s is more public than others but even people like John Dehlin via podcasts and many, many bloggers have went through stages of faith in a public forum.
Hindsight is 20/20, right? I cringe to think of some blog posts I wrote 6 or 7 years ago. Maybe in 2017 I’ll feel that way about where I was at in 2010. Or not.
That is not to say that Dutcher has any regrets, just that what he made in the past and what he’s making now is reflective of way points along his own journey. We may not be on the same journey with him now but maybe our paths will cross again in the future. Who knows? I admire him for being true to himself at those way points.
“The prophecy of “good and bad” being spoken of him seems to mean that no one can tell his story neutrally.”
I agree, to a point. The idea that his “…name shall be had for good and evil” really wasn’t all that prophetic, but the wording makes it sound better. A more proper translation of that “prophecy” would have been, “and behold, some people shall believe you, and others shall not”.
The only true and living LDS film on the face of the earth is Johnny Lingo.
I liked his first few films very much. I thought that perhaps his ego has gotten in the way. As the LDS film genre got dumber and dumber, he was very frustrated at both the quality and the lack of recognition.
I guess that affected his faith as well.
Would a Mormon version of Graham Greene — unorthodox, mostly disaffected, but ultimately still can’t-help-myself faithful — ever be possible?
Or is Church membership just and all-or-nothing proposition? That is, you either take the hagiographic view whole hog, and never realistically humanize the guys in the white hats, or you go (as Dutcher seems to have gone) all the way not into non-Mormonism but agnosticism/atheism?
I liked the Other Side of Heaven, but in the podcast Dutcher makes a great point on the healing seen – it’s stripped of any Mormonism whatsoever.
States of Grace was really good I thought.
I *want* to continue to love Dutcher’s films, but I can’t anymore. The current direction/style/genres of his films is entirely unappealing to me.
Even my wife doesn’t believe me, but God’s Army was the only portrayal of *my* mission experience. 85% of the movie happened to me and I was touched by what *I* saw as the reality of the mission experience. I pointed my friends and family to the movie and said “if you want to see my mission, watch the film.” I saw it multiple times in the theater, even.
I really enjoyed Brigham City. He has said he wasn’t making a murder-mystery/thriller, and he’s right. It is a movie about trust, love, making costly mistakes, and ultimately forgiveness. It just happened to have “murder mystery” as a setting. I thought it was a very well done indy film.
At about this time, I had really high hopes for “Mormon Cinema.” He was a great example of a talented, believing artist who wasn’t hopelessly romantic about Mormonism. He could write and use mormon characters, and a mormon worldview to tell good stories. I was looking forward to many more films on varied subjects, but with mormon settings or characters.
I didn’t get any of this, essentially. All the piles-of-feces Mormon comedy films all launched, the horrifyingly bad Book of Mormon movie came out, and it totally killed my interest in seeing a Mormon onscreen *ever again*. By the time State of Grace came out, I wouldn’t give it the time of day. By that time, it looked to me like a knee-jerk reaction to the crap that came before, and descriptions of the movie seemed to confirm my preconception that it was trying to be edgy for edginess’ sake.
I was going to skip it and wait for his next film, after the junk-films had faded from memory. Unfortunately, all the films that he has made since then are not my cup of tea. He’s not serving my demographic anymore. I don’t like horror movies (Evil Angel), violent movies (Falling), or even more “death, loss, and loss of faith” movies (Triptych).
I was sad to hear in the podcast that he still felt like he had been maligned by the Church and church membership because of resigning. Not being from, or even spending much time in, Utah, I have no idea what people’s reactions were like to him during and after his disaffection. In my circles outside of Utah, if you bring up his name they may say “I think I know that name, did he do ‘God’s Army’?” but none know or even care about him leaving the church. I’m sad that he still claims to feel like the “one lost lamb who’s had his brains blown out for wandering.” Very grieved.
Based on what I heard in the podcast, I’m pretty much over thinking of him as a “mormon filmmaker” in the big tent way. He doesn’t consider himself mormon in any way any more, and considered his life in the church as a phase he’s “over now” and he isn’t interested using mormonism for his films anymore. I do applaud his method of leaving: little fanfare, no martyr complex, no endless gnashing of teeth and harping on the church, no permanent victim status. He merely doesn’t believe and therefore doesn’t practice anymore. A model for all, IMO.
I wish him well in whatever he’s doing. I hope he finds the success and happiness we all want. If he starts making films that interest me, I’ll continue to watch them. He hasn’t burnt his bridges with me like George Lucas has.
“one can practically see the blood and sweat, the physical force pushing light through the celluloid in the effort to grab hold of something in a spiritually rudderless world”
Hmm. There was one, of course, who shed blood and sweat to provide that rudder. Pity that Ducher lost sight of that.
“I do applaud his method of leaving: little fanfare, no martyr complex, no endless gnashing of teeth and harping on the church, no permanent victim status. He merely doesn’t believe and therefore doesn’t practice anymore. A model for all”
Agreed. Especially for being on such a public stage. Any one of the situations described would have caused his transition to be a much more painful experience to watch from the outside.
I hadn’t considered evil angel as a way to make money and more mainstream. does anyone know if it has been a commercial success at this juncture?
if he was going mainstream, I would think he would consider something different like a romantic comedy or something like that.
I think most horror films generally have a guarantee that they’ll make some money, and most of them are awful, so if Evil Angel is decent at all, and somehow manages to get released to a wider audience, I’m sure it will do well enough. It hasn’t been released wide enough yet for that to happen, as far as I understand. Christian Bale once said he did movies like Batman Begins and etc. so he could do the movies he really wants to do (i.e. those that don’t make much, but have stories that are more appealing to him as an actor). I imagine the same is true for Dutcher. From the podcast it sounds like he enjoys all types of movies, but the spiritual film is what he really wants to do.
I didn’t make much of Richard Dutcher after the first film. Have to agree that it was the first real treatment of missionary life, but he did over-Hollywood some parts of the movie. When he wrote, directed, and stared in the second film I knew he was spiritually toast. It came off as hubris rather than creative necessity. The story was over the top, predictable, and frankly condescending. Because it came from him I thought these elements of the movie captured Dutcher’s personality.
After that I didn’t care what he did because it all felt forced. His rants about Mormon cinema only solidified my distrust of him. He was not the King of the Mormon Cinema World no matter how right his views might have been superficially. I was not at all surprised he left the Church when he wasn’t taken seriously as a Prophet of Mormon Movies.
I think Dutcher could pull off a Rough Stone Rolling type film. I think he still respects Mormonism, even though it is not for him. I don’t think he’ll be unsympathetic or unfactual.
Say what you will about Dutcher — you can’t deny that he has put every bit of himself into making his dreams a reality, and that is a pretty impressive accomplishment in my book. I haven’t seen all of his stuff, but from what I know of his life and his commitment to his craft, I am pretty impressed with the guy.
God’s Army started out pretty good and then descended into self-absorbed, saccharin absurdity.
Brigham City was your average made-for-TV movie that again ruined it’s premise so painfully that it isn’t worth wasting your time on.
I have no use of Richard Dutcher as a filmmaker. I find him to be hypocritical in his criticisms of Mormon movies, though fundamentally right at the same time.
As for his personal life, our journeys have been different, but similar enough that I know where he’s coming from. I’m perhaps a little more jaded than him, especially looking back and my teenage experience in the church [which was both great and horrifically manipulative], but have not interesting in banging the anti-Mormon drums and am glad he hasn’t (though some more objective films about Mormonism would be interesting–unfortunately, Mormons would see them as anti-Mormon while non-Mormons would just be bored. A reason I’ve never bothered trying to make such a movie.)
It seems in both Brigham City and States of Grace, there is a bit of a disconnect between what Dutcher seems as a great ending, and what audiences view as “over-the top”. From his interviews, it sounds like his wife and investors expressed concerns, but there was overconfidence that the self-written screenplay contained the perfect ending. Had there been a few less gut punches in States of Grace, it might now be sitting on the shelves of most God’s Army DVD buyers, instead of being viewed and returned.
I will say that listening to his interview, Dutcher seems like a great person to have as a friend…someone to whom you could talk with about anything. I feel bad about how he was treated after his press conference announcing the JS movie. All those knives in the back and unsolicited criticisms must have had an impact, even if one has a thick skin.
He likens himself to an Orson Wells rather than a Frank Capra. That is telling. Most of us watch Citizen Kane once so we can say we’ve seen it, while “It’s a Wonderful Life” is played every Christmas forever, and we’ve seen it so many times, we are sick of it.