Just Too Preachy: Faith-Based Film ‘Just One More’ Struggles to Tell A Dark Story
(REVIEW) Christian films have always struggled to tell dark stories. Even though their biggest hit (”The Passion of the Christ”) was one of the most violent movies most people have ever seen, most Christian films since then have primarily been marketed toward a Christian market (specifically women over 35) who don’t like dark material.
This sometimes creates awkward storytelling when Christian films try to tell stories of lost people finding redemption (like “Jesus Revolution”) while watering down the lost part.
But things are changing. More and more Christian films are leaning into darker storylines and storytelling, and showing rather than telling. Movies like “The Blind” and shows like “House of David” showcase murder, betrayal, adultery and abuse. Smaller Christian films like “Still Hope” are more frequently making gritty topics like trafficking part of their DNA rather than on the periphery.
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“Just One More” follows in that recent tradition. It’s also an example of why faith-based filmmakers have so much trouble sticking the landing with these kinds of stories.
“Just One More” follows Jess, a recovering addict who meets Charles, a dying man praying God will use him “just one more” time. As their lives collide, Jess battles shame and doubt while discovering faith in Jesus, forgiveness and the courage to fight for a future beyond addiction.
The film is an independently produced feature film from Twinbolt Media, a faith-based studio with a mission of being “committed to telling authentic, high-quality stories that inspire hope and glorify God.” It’s now streaming on the Angel Studios service, and it continues Angel’s growing dominance (alongside Amazon) as a leading distributor of faith-based content.
There’s a lot to like about what “Just One More” is trying to do. Jesse showcases the difficulty of overcoming addiction and how recovery requires a strong community. Charlie and Xavier show the challenges of being that Christian community — balancing unconditional forgiveness and boundary setting.
One scene in particular, when Jess is having a relapse, shows a visceral experience of pain in relapse and withdrawal.
But so few of these concepts are shown rather than told. “Just One More” is almost literally scene after scene of info dump from practically the very beginning. Some exposition is necessary to fill in background information and the parts of the story you can’t show. But those moments of exposition should serve as bridges to action. “Just One More” rarely gets to the “show” moments. Almost every new scene is just characters talking.
Jesse tells us how tough it is to wake up every day wanting to take drugs and how tough it is not to do it. And yet, we only see one or two times where she actually struggles to do that. So the regular, daily, moment-by-moment struggle is missed. She tells us how she keeps disappointing people who trust her, and that’s why she doesn’t deserve anyone else’s trust, and doesn’t trust them when they give it. But we never see her break people’s trust over and over again. We only see it happen once or maybe twice. And it’s pretty mild at that.
This softening of the story's grimness is another common problem in Christian films that the movie indulges in. Most of Jesse’s bad behavior we see is pretty mild. We see her steal pills once and never use them. We see her walk out on her friends once and yell at them. We hear her vaguely talk about how she’s done worse. But we never see that.
I know why this happens. Christian film audiences tend to find portrayals of sin off-putting and worry that it can trigger temptation, where the thing seems appealing rather than sinful. Talking about how it happened or happens off-screen feels safer.
Likewise, the Christian film genre has largely been defined by the past 20 years by Baptist and non-denominational filmmakers whose experiences of articulating the Christian message are largely preaching accompanied by music. So it makes sense that the movies made by them would be gospel lectures and exposition-based, accompanied by a rock concert. (Hence “Just One More”’s ending.)
But movies are different. Here, not showing things undermines the messages the films are trying to convey. We watch movies because experiencing them ourselves is what’s powerful. “Just One More” is trying to show how the Christian community and forgiveness can lead to redemption. But because we don’t see the struggle of Jesse to do it on her own, day after day, we don’t truly experience how bad it is.
Likewise, they could have shown us Charlie’s daily grind of reaching out to people to share the gospel with and seeing the rejections and conversations he had. Or they could have shown us Jesse repeatedly breaking Charles and Xavier’s trust and showing them wrestling with how to keep forgiving her and setting boundaries.
More recent Christian films that have tried to be more gritty — such as “The Blind,” “Sound of Hope” and “Still Hope” — have still tried to blunt the edge by constantly including lectures and voiceovers to explain to you exactly what you’re supposed to think and feel about everything happening.
But this only had the effect of blunting the emotional effect. The irony is that “The Passion of the Christ” — the movie that started the faith-based film genre in the first place — did none of those things. It showed every moment of Jesus’ crucifixion. It let the experience and the story speak for themselves.
“Just One More” has its heart in the right place. But it is held back by a Christian filmmaking culture that leans on telling, not showing. The sooner more faith-based films move past that, the more people will be impacted by their worthy work.
Joseph Holmes is an award-nominated filmmaker and culture critic living in New York. He is co-host of the podcast “The Overthinkers” and its companion website theoverthinkersjournal.world, where he discusses art, culture and faith with his fellow overthinkers. His other work and contact info can be found at josephholmesstudios.com.