Unsung Hero

Grade: C+

There’s a Cranberries song that is heavily featured in the trailer for Unsung Hero. Because of this, I had it in my head that it was a movie about the forming of The Cranberries. It’s not, and that song, unfortunately, doesn’t appear in the film. The first 75% of Unsung Hero seems to be about one obvious thing, only for one of the secondary subplots (you might call it the B plot or C plot) to suddenly take over in the last act, and the viewer is like “oh, it’s really about this other thing. So, why was there so much focus on that first plot for so long?”

Two successful Christian rock artists/groups came from the large Smallbone family – Rebecca St. James and For King & Country. I’d never heard of either, but I’ve been playing in the band at my church for 8 years; I wonder if I’ve done any of their songs. Rebecca ends up being the primary storyline, but most of Unsung Hero focuses on the dad’s journey. Joel Smallbone stars as his real-life father David Smallbone. I read online that there are 9 children in the family. I think I counted 6 in the movie, with a seventh on the way.

We are in 1992. David is a music promoter who has fallen on hard times. Gigs and clients are becoming fewer and farther between. As a desperate last ditch effort, he and his wife Helen uproot their large family across the pond, from Australia to Nashville (the real-life Rebecca makes a cameo as the flight attendant). They are red-flagged by customs (“If I was going to make up a name, I would have come up with something better than Smallbone,” David tells them), but make it through, due to something having to do with a note Helen’s mom wrote. It’s a frustrating, vague, insufficiently given explanation.

They find a modest house. They can’t afford furniture. They find literally any odd jobs they can do for people, which gravitates them into a little lawn/yard work business. They are welcomed warmly at the local church, and David is embarrassed by their generosity to the point of telling one of the parishioners off (Lucas Black, the kid from Sling Blade). He and Candace Cameron Bure are quite good as the sweet do-gooder forward-payers. I wanted a little more air time devoted to the resolution of that subplot after the conflict. Joel Smallbone and Daisy Betts, as David and Helen, are effective, and their characters are well-developed.

But wait! It’s not really about them. Rebecca’s singing talents pay off, and late in the movie, this arc suddenly takes full priority. The children blended together for me, until all of a sudden, it ends with Rebecca Smallbone becoming Rebecca St. James – as well as two Smallbone brothers forming and having great success with For King & Country. Unsung Hero falls into the subset of Christian-centric B movies. Jesus Revolution, On a Wing and a Prayer, and The Hill are recent examples. I haven’t loved any of those I’ve seen, but the best ones are perfectly adequate. On Fire is my favorite of the lot. Unsung Hero falls into the usual trap with these films, where it’s very treacly. It’s a cacophony of unearned heavy moments. If the parents were given the backseat, focusing instead on the journey of Rebecca and her brothers, how much better would it play? I can only imagine.

Grade: C+