Today's Thought For The Day comes from Dallas-based Pentacostal preacher TD Jakes, author of such titles as 'Women, Thou Art Loosed' and 'The Lady, Her Lover And Her Lord'. Not Easily Broken is adapted from Jakes' novel about a couple working their way through marital strife. It is unspeakably naff, unintentionally funny and unapologetically Christian. Judged on its own terms, it's a resounding success. But for non-believers it will likely prove a living purgatory.
The title is taken from the Old Testament (you were expecting the Bhagavad Gita?) and refers to the sturdy three-stranded cord of marriage, with one cord representing the women, the other the man and the third, You Know Who. The knot can be undone, of course, but it is not easily broken - hey! (Although most marriages are probably more like a round turn and two half hitches.) Ten years into marriage, the cord of African-American couple Dave (Morris Chestnut) and Clarice (Taraji P Henson) has begun to fray. She's an estate agent; he's a little league coach. He wants kids; she wants to delay having children to climb the career ladder. They're pulling in different directions. Then bad stuff happens. You know something grim is coming up, because during their wedding flashback Bishop Wilkes (Albert Hall) warns them, "Life is going to try and knock you down." Nice one mate. Another slice of cake? After a car crash leaves Clarice's legs mangled, her harpie mother (Jenifer Lewis) blames Dave for the accident and moves in to help look after her - driving Dave into the arms of Julie (Maeve Quinlan), his wife's physiotherapist and a single mom. A white single mom. You know the kind of white Heinrich Himmler had in mind when he started that whole Lebensborn programme? Like that.
However, as this is a spiritually-minded drama nearly entirely devoid of the sort of racial tension Hollywood pounces on given the slightest opportunity, the real issue here is Julie's single mom-ness. Because that kid is like catnip to a wannabe dad. Can the marriage survive all these outside influences? The stage is set for a shakedown between the meddling mother-in-law from hell and Our Father who art in Heaven.
"Do not make me go all Oprah on you" Clarice's girlfriend chides her at one point. It's too late for that. This is cornier than Kellogg's and soapier than a Persil factory. Problems include clunking plot devices (Dave's dilemma is pretty much wrapped up in one fell stroke by permanently removing Julie's 'little problem') and dialogue that makes you want to hack your ears off ("Do you know what I'm thinking? I'm thinking we need to get back to the loving part of our marriage"). Meanwhile, all our sympathies are unfairly weighted in Dave's camp as Clarice and her mum are almost completely unlikable shrews.
It also endorses a strain of Christian conservatism that some may find disgusting, summed up in a central, self-pitying lecture that suggests, essentially, that the emancipation of women gave rise to generations of feeble, hinge-wristed men who, in neglecting their God-appointed roles as workers, cultivators and protectors, "turned the whole world upside down." Poor old Dave.
Taking potshots is futile, really. This will find its audience no matter what. And they may take some comfort in its simplistic, optimistic messages of prayer and forgiveness amid an angry, uncertain world. Unrepentant heretics can amuse themselves pointing out the unwittingly lewd dialogue, such as Chestnut innocently recalling of their honeymoon, "We didn't come up for air for two days"; or laughing at the terrible, terrible MOR soul Dave listens to when he wants to retreat from his woes. The credits music, incidentally, features a prime example of Christian rap - exposure to which may convince you, without a shadow of a doubt, that the devil really does have all the best tunes.
The title is taken from the Old Testament (you were expecting the Bhagavad Gita?) and refers to the sturdy three-stranded cord of marriage, with one cord representing the women, the other the man and the third, You Know Who. The knot can be undone, of course, but it is not easily broken - hey! (Although most marriages are probably more like a round turn and two half hitches.) Ten years into marriage, the cord of African-American couple Dave (Morris Chestnut) and Clarice (Taraji P Henson) has begun to fray. She's an estate agent; he's a little league coach. He wants kids; she wants to delay having children to climb the career ladder. They're pulling in different directions. Then bad stuff happens. You know something grim is coming up, because during their wedding flashback Bishop Wilkes (Albert Hall) warns them, "Life is going to try and knock you down." Nice one mate. Another slice of cake? After a car crash leaves Clarice's legs mangled, her harpie mother (Jenifer Lewis) blames Dave for the accident and moves in to help look after her - driving Dave into the arms of Julie (Maeve Quinlan), his wife's physiotherapist and a single mom. A white single mom. You know the kind of white Heinrich Himmler had in mind when he started that whole Lebensborn programme? Like that.
However, as this is a spiritually-minded drama nearly entirely devoid of the sort of racial tension Hollywood pounces on given the slightest opportunity, the real issue here is Julie's single mom-ness. Because that kid is like catnip to a wannabe dad. Can the marriage survive all these outside influences? The stage is set for a shakedown between the meddling mother-in-law from hell and Our Father who art in Heaven.
"Do not make me go all Oprah on you" Clarice's girlfriend chides her at one point. It's too late for that. This is cornier than Kellogg's and soapier than a Persil factory. Problems include clunking plot devices (Dave's dilemma is pretty much wrapped up in one fell stroke by permanently removing Julie's 'little problem') and dialogue that makes you want to hack your ears off ("Do you know what I'm thinking? I'm thinking we need to get back to the loving part of our marriage"). Meanwhile, all our sympathies are unfairly weighted in Dave's camp as Clarice and her mum are almost completely unlikable shrews.
It also endorses a strain of Christian conservatism that some may find disgusting, summed up in a central, self-pitying lecture that suggests, essentially, that the emancipation of women gave rise to generations of feeble, hinge-wristed men who, in neglecting their God-appointed roles as workers, cultivators and protectors, "turned the whole world upside down." Poor old Dave.
Taking potshots is futile, really. This will find its audience no matter what. And they may take some comfort in its simplistic, optimistic messages of prayer and forgiveness amid an angry, uncertain world. Unrepentant heretics can amuse themselves pointing out the unwittingly lewd dialogue, such as Chestnut innocently recalling of their honeymoon, "We didn't come up for air for two days"; or laughing at the terrible, terrible MOR soul Dave listens to when he wants to retreat from his woes. The credits music, incidentally, features a prime example of Christian rap - exposure to which may convince you, without a shadow of a doubt, that the devil really does have all the best tunes.