I’d like to start this review by quoting one of my favorite episode of King of the Hill.

Church Hopping, which aired during King of the Hill‘s 10th season, found Hank and his family searching for a new church after the reverend of their old church blows off Hank’s suggestion that seating should be assigned.  Peggy wants the family to start attending the new mega-church but Hank worries that it might be too big for him.  However, after the Hills have tried out every other church in town and found them to be not quite right for their needs, Peggy tells Hanks that they only have two options — go to the new megachurch or “live the empty barren existence of secular humanism.”  Hank finally agrees to give the megachurch a try.

At first, Hank loves the place.  He appreciates that the church broadcasts Cowboys games on Sunday.  He gets along with all of the members.  But, quickly, the church starts to dominate every aspect of his life.  As he feared, it is simply too big for him.  As he tells his nephew-in-law, Lucky, “My old church wouldn’t pay attention to me and my new church won’t leave me alone.”  When Hank announces that he will no longer be attending church and will instead look for some other way to worship, Peggy brings the church’s pastor to the house to counsel him.

After struggling for a bit to explain why he’s not comfortable at the megachurch, Hank finally exclaims, “No offense, but your church just keeps coming at you.”

Luckily, things work out in the end.  The Hills return to their old church and are spared from secular humanism.  It’s heart-warming in the way that the best episodes of King of Hill often were.  And that line about the church has always stuck with me.

I have to admit that, as I watched the 2011 film No Lost Cause, I found myself thinking about Hank’s lament.  No Lost Cause is about a young college student named Beth Ann Collins (Caitlyn Waltermire) who is paralyzed as the result of a car accident.  Making matters even worse for Beth Ann is that, after her accident, she finds herself living with her father, a farmer named Billy (Brian Douglas Baker).

Billy is an outspoken Christian.

Beth Ann is a bitter agnostic.  (This is one of those films where it’s pretty much taken for granted that all nonbelievers are bitter about something.)

Together …. THEY SOLVE CRIMES!

No, actually, they fight a lot.  Beth Ann does not want Billy in her life and she’s not amused when he keeps insisting that she comes to church with him.  Billy is not happy when Beth Ann announces that she just wants to stay in her bedroom and work on vaguely defined college work.  I know that the film expected us to automatically sympathize with Billy but I have to admit that I was on Beth Ann’s side the entire time.  It’s not just that Beth Ann had every right to be angry about her situation.  It’s also that Billy’s church just keeps coming at her.

Billy tells Beth Ann that they’re going to the church potluck.  While everyone else eats, Beth Ann sits in a corner and does some ill-defined term paper work.  Nick (Nils Hamilton) approaches her and asks why she’s at the potluck if she’s not going to eat.  And I’m just like, “BECAUSE HER DAD MADE HER COME!  Now leave her alone and let her write her paper!”

(I also have to admit that, by the end of the whole potluck scene, I was yelling at the characters in the film, “Say ‘potluck’ one more time!  GO ON, I DARE YOU!”  Seriously, potluck is just an annoying word.)

Later, at the house, Beth Ann is again trying to get work on her paper done when Billy shows up and announces that he’s invited the entire church over for dinner.  Suddenly, the house is full of people and while Beth Ann sits in a corner and tries to do her work, people keep sitting down at the table with her and talking to her.  Beth Ann has no desire to speak to anyone and actually does have some important work to do but that doesn’t matter to the members of Billy’s church.  They just keep coming at her.

“Seriously,” I found myself yelling at the screen, “leave Beth Ann alone!  She doesn’t want to talk to you!”

(I may have been projecting because it seems like whenever I’m in the middle of doing something important, I get interrupted.)

Anyway, the film gets off to a pretty rough start but it does get better.  Beth Ann does eventually grow comfortable about living with Billy and she even falls in love with Nick.  It’s predictable but occasionally sweet and Caitlyn Watermire gives a good and sympathetic performance as Beth Ann.  Unfortunately, the film also has Beth Ann suddenly regain the ability to walk, with the suggestion being that it’s all due to her newly found faith but that only forces the audience to wonder about all of the faithful who have a better attitude than Beth Ann but still don’t get healed.  It’s hard not to feel that the film would have been more effective if it had focused on Beth Ann coming to terms with being in the wheelchair as opposed to falling back on a miracle.

As a love story, No Lost Cause works a bit better than you might expect.  Caitlyn Watermire and Nils Hamilton have a likable chemistry and you do hope find yourself hoping the best for them, even if Nick does come across as a bit pushy about the whole potluck thing.  This is one of those film’s that will probably be best appreciated by people who already share the film’s view of the world but, as far as religious-themed films are concerned, No Lost Cause is better acted than most and it features some nice shots of the countryside.  That said, it’s still hard to watch the film without feeling that Beth Ann occasionally deserves some time to herself.