Unlike Armageddon Time (which I just reviewed) which does not actually have anything to do with Armageddon, Homestead does.  And its view of how it may come about is altogether convincing, if perhaps a little soft.  The first few minutes of the story dramatize one very plausible way in which disaster may overtake our beloved country, not through overpowering military attack but by small, intimate, personal action taken by ordinary people, committed to destruction.  Then the film focuses on the people fleeing the calamity, and the drama turns in a different direction.

Ben Smallbone’s story begins with a nuclear detonation just off the California coast.  Various people head toward Colorado, where Ian Ross (Neal McDonough) has a large compound, plenty of food and supplies and a mercenary defense force to defend it.  Two by two (generally) his friends and relatives arrive for safe haven, while outside his gates a crowd develops, also hoping to share and survive the coming storm.  As tensions rise bullets fly and people began to be hurt.  But Ian’s greatest crisis isn’t outside the gates; it’s the feeling of his wife Jenna (Dawn Olivieri) that their rejection of the community outside will be the downfall of them all.

I did not know anything about this film before seeing it.  It became apparent very quickly that its producers (Angel Studios) have an agenda toward an “uplifting” style of entertainment, eschewing violence and profanity and emphasizing deeper religious aspects of life that rarely see the light of movie screens.  To my surprise, this actually did not bother me very much.  The film doesn’t become preachy until close to the end, when Jenna makes a decision which will divide viewers into the “it’s the right thing to do” camp and the “she just doomed everything” camp.  To its credit the drama actually raises some sticky ethical and personal dilemmas and does not provide either easy or inspirational answers.  For the most part this is a well meaning and entirely plausible drama about trying to maintain some semblance of society while much of the country suffers (offscreen) through horror, famine, chaos and despair.

That said, it is also an idyllic view of how the end of modern America would begin.  Perhaps because of its gentler approach the coming chaos never seems very close or all that problematic.  The movie could have used some apocalyptic grit.  It is also odd to me that such an “inspirational” view of how we should stick together and help one another should have such an emphasis on guns and security.  Perhaps I should not be surprised, for the combination of automatic weapons and Bibles seems to be an American dichotomy — albeit one I have never really understood.

One other oddity needs to be addressed.  Evidently this movie, for that’s what it is — I saw it in a theater — is also a television series.  How’s that?  I’m not sure, but during the end credits there were additional scenes of the characters carrying on and battling others (and each other, evidently) as the story continues, followed by one of the actors exhorting the audience to watch the upcoming series, for which the movie is purportedly serving as a pilot episode.  It’s all based on a series of books (the “Black Autumn” series) and will undoubtedly be unfolding across home screens in the near future.  ☆ ☆.  12 January 2025.