90 Minutes in Heaven - The Movie

Here is the link for the movie trailer:

http://youtu.be/XOko8hlVAlM

On September 15, I had the opportunity to go and see the movie 90 Minutes in Heaven, based on the book by Don Piper.  It stars Hayden Christensen and Kate Bosworth as a Christian husband and wife.  He’s a pastor, firm in his faith and looking to plant a new church.  On his way home from a conference, his car is hit by a truck, and he is killed.  In the chaos of sorting out the accident on the road, another pastor comes along and asks to pray for the man in the car, Don Piper, who emergency workers have already said is dead.  They are only awaiting the coroner to make the pronouncement official.  Pastor Piper was left as dead for about 90 minutes, but comes alive when prayed for.

The bulk of the film is about the struggle that the couple goes through during his recovery.  He is severely broken.  The conflict comes in a few places: Pastor Piper in his pain and agony, versus his desire to let himself die and go back to heave… his home, and how does a pastors’ wife and teacher manage her husband’s recovery, and kids and support structure and bills and his desire to just die?

In general, I thought this story was good.  It’s almost too hard to watch because of such turmoil that the couple is able to overcome.  But they did overcome.  I think at points the film was a little too slow.  It could have been about 20 minutes shorter.  There was a technical flaw in one scene that was distracting.

I wasn’t sure what to expect with this film, but I thought there would be more about heaven.  I go back and forth with this.  I thought there should be more about heaven, but at the same time I’m always leery of putting heaven on screen because I don’t think our imagination can do it justice from a film perspective.

As a Christian, I hope many others will see this film about perseverance in time of struggle, and how the faith of others can bring us through the toughest of times.  Seeing Pastor Piper at the end of the film in excellent health and preaching was very encouraging.

Thanks to Graff Martin for the passes to get to see the film.  This has been my honest review.