Breakthrough (2019)

★

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When her 14-year-old son drowns in a lake, a faithful mother prays for him to come back from the brink of death and be healed.

Classification: 12A

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Smug in every sense of the world, Breakthrough preens through its predictable story with its thin character development, lack of challenging drama and self-righteous attitude towards the material. At no point does director Roxann Dawson allow for any ambiguity or doubt towards the religious themes, instead of like the main character gives the attitude of “I believe in God, therefore I am better than you”. While the themes of family, community strength, faith and survivor’s guilt are prominent throughout the film, Breakthrough never allows for any meaningful commentary on this, instead every time making it about belief in God.

Performances are the film’s strong suit but even they are marred by the thematic issues throughout the film. Chrissy Metz’s performance as a terrified mother praying for her son’s survival comes off as arrogant and obnoxious with her inability to allow anyone to doubt for a second what God’s plan could be. There are times where it would seem Breakthrough is setting up the characters for a crisis of faith teased so briefly with Josh Lucas’s character and even briefer with Metz’s. However any form of internal character conflict is dismissed in almost every scene so it can just become a new iteration of Metz’s “I believe in God, therefore I am better than you” attitude to every doctor and visitor who may think that a child who spent 45 minutes without a pulse might possibly have brain damage.

For the moments when Breakthrough isn’t condemning you for not praying, it does focus on humanity’s great empathy for each other. This story is one of people coming together to support each other and again offers a small celebration for those who serve to protect their communities. Topher Grace’s performance as Pastor Jason Noble is a highlight of the film as his character is probably on the only positive portrayal of community and religion coming together. However Breakthrough remains so single-minded in its approach that the predictable story beats and characters soon become unbearable that even the community moments are too much to bear.

I will admit that I am not a religious person but Breakthrough doesn’t even allow its themes to be challenged. At no point is faith seriously questioned or characters questioned, it makes the conflicts within the story entirely one-sided and makes the conclusions to the story entirely unsatisfying. The screenplay and direction fail the potential of the story at every level which makes Breakthrough alienating to its audiences. The crisis of the film would lead characters to gravitate towards faith as an outlet of comfort but the way the “miracles” of the film are presented are completely consequence-free and damage any potential realism and immersion for the audience.

Breakthrough doesn’t treat its audience as an equal as it preaches its messaging with as much subtlety as a Christian propaganda film. Skilled actors are let down by a poorly written script and misguided direction as the obnoxious moralising of the main characters kills any possible interesting story. Despite moments of genuine emotion, the film is a victim of its own arrogance as it doesn’t allow for a moment of humility or reflection on very serious themes and storylines.

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Director: #RoxannDawson

Cast: #ChrissyMetz, #JoshLucas, #TopherGrace, #MikeColter, #MarcelRuiz, #SamTrammel, #DennisHaysbert

Release Date: May 17th 2019.

Trailer: 

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Written review copyright ©CoreyBullochReviews

Images and Synopsis from the Internet Movie Database