It’s undeniably hard to make a movie about faith and miracles with grace and subtlety, but couldn't director Mark Pellington and writer Albert Torres have put a little effort into it? About as subtle as a prayer revival meeting tag-teamed by Jeremiah Wright and Al Sharpton, the awful Henry Poole Is Here hammers home its desire to teach you a lesson about hope like a marathon of NBC's "Now You Know" commercials. With a pre-production that failed in nearly every way - bad casting, choice of direction, lack of rewrites - Henry Poole is Here is one of those rare films that could be called a "day one disaster," a film that probably never could have worked in any way. And it only went downhill from there.

Having said that, you can see what worked enough about the first act of Henry Poole Is Here to attract some major names in front of and behind the camera. The basic idea of a tragic figure finding faith is an appealing one. One of the few nice things that you can say about the film is that it at least distracted Luke Wilson away from his horrendous mainstream choices like My Super Ex-Girlfriend to allow him to show a bit more dramatic range. But the final product actually makes me feel a little sorry for him. Wilson plays the title character, a poor guy who discovers that he has a short time to live and moves to the street he grew up on to finish his days in a haze of booze and Krispy Kreme donuts. Poole's new neighbors include a kind, religious woman named Esperanza (Adriana Barraza) – "hope" in Spanish – on one side and a gorgeous single mother named Dawn (Radha Mitchell) on the other. Don't you think someone could have told Torres that themes-in-character-naming is the kind of thing you can do in a college theatre project but not a major motion picture? There's even a secondary character named Patience (Rachel Seiferth). No, I’m not kidding. Dawn has a mute little girl named Millie (Morgan Lily), who may not have a symbolic name, but was clearly the cutest kid in central casting that day.

The very faithful Esperanza spots a water stain on the side of Henry's house that she thinks looks like the face of Christ. When it develops a small spot of blood that can't be explained or washed away, the battle of believers versus the atheistic Poole reaches a fever pitch. Is it the face of God? Can it really make mute girls speak and blind girls see? Could it save Henry? Of course, there's also a love story between Henry and Dawn, a manipulative back story for Esperanza, a child in danger, and more lessons about the power of faith than any script could possibly handle.

Maybe it couldn't have worked in anyone's hands, but I'm not sure there's ever been a worse fit for a movie about finding faith in a bad stucco job than director Mark Pellington. In the past, I've defended the music video director, who seemed like a good choice for the amped-up material of Arlington Road and The Mothman Prophecies. Henry Poole Is Here, however, could not possibly display a worse match of director and material. With four or five musical montages too many, Pellington hammers and hammers the themes of Henry Poole Is Here into the audience with such force that it literally starts to get uncomfortable. Characters come right out and ask each other if they believe in God, and every single scene feels like part of a manipulative sermon. Hope and faith, by their very nature, are issues that need to be handled with question marks. Atheists and the faithful, no one knows anything for sure. And yet, Henry Poole Is Here features nothing but ham-fisted periods.

Rating: ONE BONE

 Reviewed by Brian Tallerico (MovieRetriever.com Film Critic)

Release Date: August 15, 2008

Rating: PG

Starring: Luke Wilson, Radha Mitchell, Adriana Barraza, George Lopez, Cheryl Hines, Richard Benjamin, Rachel Seiferth, and Morgan Lily

Director: Mark Pellington

Writer: Albert Torres