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Bob Hoose

Movie Review

Alec Bailey isn’t necessarily a bad guy. He’s just a guy who’s lost and a little broken.

After the death of his twin brother, Alec had a tough time coping with life. He let their London-based repair shop flounder and he started investing all his time in affairs and heavy gambling. In fact, he’s so deep in it all now that his business is closing, he has to keep an eye out for raging husbands at every turn, and the Russian mob wants his head.

So it appears as a happy coincidence when Alec’s estranged uncle, Raymond Heacock, shows up with a mysterious but very appealing deal: He’ll pay off Alec’s debt—to the tune of some 89,000 pounds—and in exchange, Alec just needs to get away for a while.

In two days Alec will jump on a plane, his uncle tells him, fly to Canadian Nova Scotia and live in a small, fully appointed house that he owns there.

But here’s the catch: Alec has to stay there for an entire year.

Alec reluctantly agrees. He figures he can pick up his old business and fix some appliances in his spare time. Trouble is, the Canadian provincial life isn’t as easy as it sounds. Alec meets a pretty local veterinarian who’s quite nice, but everyone and everything else in the small town of Luneberg is a little strange. Sheep follow him around like metal shavings to a magnet. The local cop glowers at his every move. People show up unannounced in his living room.

And then when the local newspaper mixes up Alec’s ad offering fix-it appliance work by making it look like he’s advertising himself as a faith healer, things get really crazy. What the completely flustered Alec doesn’t realize, though, is the fact that the Heacock family has a long history in the community of being none other than faith healers. And when Alec turns 30, in just a few days, he’ll have a very big decision to make. One that will potentially change everything.

Positive Elements

Despite its faith healer storyline, the film takes quite a bit of time examining another sort of healing: How simply getting involved in people’s lives and loving through difficulties can have a reparative and, at the very least, heartening effect on others. And it points out that hope is a vital part of life.

For example, a young girl with cancer, named Abigail, asks Alec to spend time with her simply as a gift to her parents. She says she doesn’t believe in faith healers, but just a shred of hope will lift her parent’s spirits.

In turn, as Abigail spends time with Alec and Cecilia (the veterinarian), she finds a renewed joy in their company and in the animals at Cecilia’s farm/clinic.

Spiritual Elements

There are definitely spiritual moments here that are both sincere and seemingly thoughtful, and moments that are much more broad and fantastic. On the former side, we meet a number of people who talk of lifting up prayers to God and hear their hopes that He will answer them. And Alec talks to two different priests about God giving second chances when we fail in life. One of the men talks of feeling like he lost his faith, then reclaiming it in the face of harrowing circumstances.

Alec also asks about prayer and how to talk with God. The priest answers that prayer is something simple and sincere: “You talk. He listens.” Alec then goes into a church and does just that. He vents his frustrations and cries out, “If you’re good like you say you are, then why do you let young people get sick and die?”

On the other hand, there’s a more mystical storyline going on, too. It turns out that Alec is the latest of a long line of Heacocks blessed with the family ability to heal others just by being near them. Alec doesn’t believe in that “gift,” but several people are healed of their afflictions simply by being in the same room with him. Animals are mysteriously drawn to him as well.

Alec has a deadline for accepting or rejecting this ability. “Who chose me?” Alec asks his uncle. “The Big Chief. Mr. Creator. The Supreme Being … ” Raymond replies. [Spoiler Warning:] Alec rejects his gift and loses it, much to his later regret.

Young Abigail looks out over a beautiful lake and sighs out her hope that heaven might look like that. Alec wonders aloud if there even is a heaven. “What do you think happens when you die?” the girl retorts incredulously.

While trying to avoid questions from a local pastor, Alec proclaims that he’s a Buddhist. Cecelia suggest that the locals read the newspaper almost as religiously as they do the Bible.

Sexual Content

When we first see Alec, he is coming out of a woman’s bedroom. Both he and his married paramour are fully dressed but disheveled and have to lie their way around her husband. Because of Alec’s reputation as a womanizer, Cecilia falsely declares when first meeting him that she is a lesbian. Numerous comments and jokes are made about that same-sex attraction until later she admits the truth. (For instance, Alec wants to experiment with Cecilia and see if she has any reaction to his kiss; she suggests he try the kiss on a local guy instead.) The romantic spark between them eventually intensifies until they kiss. And then we see them in bed together, clothed in underwear and T-shirts.

Raymond chides Alec for his sexual proclivities, telling him, “You’re acting like a boy who just discovered his willy.” After taking a shower, Alec walks downstairs dressed only in a towel, unaware that people are waiting for him. His towel drops and a woman stands for a few moments staring at his bare backside (not seen by the camera).

Cecilia wears a low-cut top.

Violent Content

Russian goons come after Alec threatening physical harm. One of them takes Alec’s friend by the hair and slams the man’s head down on a hard surface.

A Luneberg priest has a heart attack on Alec’s porch. Two local girls see Alec pounding on the man’s chest in an attempt to revive him and think Alec is killing him. Then when Alec tries to transport the unconscious man to his truck, he drops him headfirst into the yard, then slams his head with the gate of the truck (all played for pratfall laughs).

Later, cops show up with guns to arrest Alec for murder, and one blasts a chair near him. He’s marched off at gunpoint.

Crude or Profane Language

Eight s-words are mixed with two uses of “b–tard” and five or six uses each of “h—” and “d–n.” The word “cr-p” is spit out a half dozen times. People misuse Jesus name once and call out OMG exclamations some eight times. British crudities “willy” and “bugger off” show up once each.

Drug and Alcohol Content

There’s quite a bit of drinking going on here. Alec drinks heavily in his frustration and gets drunk at one point. We see him and Cecelia drinking wine. Raymond quaffs a glass of Scotch as well, and wine at lunch. Alec and a friend have a few pints at a local pub in London. And when choking on a chip at one point, he swigs a bottle of beer to clear his throat.

Other Negative Elements

We hear about all of Alec’s bounced checks and cancelled credit cards, all due to his gambling problem. Alec helps Cecilia in the birth of a baby calf and gets covered in the mother cow’s squirting goopy afterbirth. There’s some toilet humor in the dialogue mix. For instance, after being healed, a kidney-stone sufferer announces it was his “first time peeing without praying on a rosary.” A woman convinces the handsome Alec to help her make her boyfriend jealous so the reluctant guy will propose.

Conclusion

The Healer has been labeled by some as a “faith focused” film. And indeed, there are some very upfront spiritual moments scattered throughout the storyline, including questions about God’s presence and God’s hand in our life. But viewers shouldn’t rush in looking for an altar call by movie’s end. Netflix lumps the film in its “faith and spirituality” sub-category, but to call it a Christian film would be a stretch.

You might actually call this film a feel-good secular hybrid. It raises questions about faith while mixing in non-biblical fantasy magic. It giggles at adultery and other sexual choices without really showing any of those things. And it peppers in an unexpected heap of coarse language, including several misuses of God’s and Jesus’ names.

All of that makes The Healer a fairly typical, generally approachable pic that families could watch and use as discussion fodder if they were so inclined and could navigate the film’s content issues. The story and acting are good. The characters likable. And it all ends with a Hallmark-like heartstrings pluck.

In fact, during the closing credits of The Healer, it’s revealed that this film was made to specifically benefit the Paul Newman-founded SeriousFun Children’s Network, which is devoted to kids with life-threatening illnesses. And if nothing else, that helps drive home the point that we can all be healers of a sort by giving of ourselves to organizations that work to help and heal.

And that, without question, can be a faith-focused pursuit.

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Bob Hoose

After spending more than two decades touring, directing, writing and producing for Christian theater and radio (most recently for Adventures in Odyssey, which he still contributes to), Bob joined the Plugged In staff to help us focus more heavily on video games. He is also one of our primary movie reviewers.