September Dawn
Black Diamond Pictures | Release Date: August 24, 2007 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
25
METASCORE
Generally unfavorable reviews based on 18 Critic Reviews
Positive:
1
Mixed:
6
Negative:
11

Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
38
New York Daily NewsJack Mathews
September Dawn, written by an evangelical Christian, may be the worst historical drama ever made. Read full review
38
Miami HeraldConnie Ogle
Filmmaker Christopher Cain has turned a national tragedy into a teen romance, and not in a grand, entertaining, "Titanic" way. Read full review
33
Baltimore SunChris Kaltenbach
A ham-fisted cautionary tale of religious fanaticism that would have been hooted out of even 19th-century theaters as melodrama of the most lurid kind. Read full review
30
Washington PostDesson Thomson
It's a soap opera posing as moral outrage. Read full review
30
Chicago ReaderJ.R. Jones
The villainous turns by Jon Voight (as a hard-hearted Mormon bishop) and Terence Stamp (as a bloodthirsty Brigham Young) would have been more fun if they weren't part of such a clumsy campaign to lay this tragedy at the church's doorstep. Read full review
25
The A.V. ClubSteven Hyden
With its complete lack of empathy for early Mormons and simplistic rendering of historical figures, September Dawn is that rare movie that actually deserves whatever condemnation might come from religious groups. Read full review
25
Entertainment WeeklyOwen Gleiberman
The audience gets the message (religious fanaticism: bad), but nothing we see is convincing on its own. Read full review
20
Austin ChronicleMarjorie Baumgarten
Muddled, sloppy, and obfuscating. Read full review
0
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
What a strange, confused, unpleasant movie this is. Two theories have clustered around it: (1) It is anti-Mormon propaganda to muddy the waters around the presidential campaign of Mitt Romney, or (2) it is not about Mormons at all, but an allegory about the 9/11/01 terrorists. Take your choice. The problem with allegories is that you can plug them in anywhere. No doubt the film would have great impact in Darfur. Read full review
0
New York PostKyle Smith
Succeeds completely at failure; the unified incompetence of its writing, directing and acting suggest a man who manages to be on fire and drowning at the same time, just as the bus runs him over. Read full review
0
The New York TimesMatt Zoller Seitz
The maudlin, grotesque western September Dawn, about the massacre on Sept. 11, 1857, of about 120 settlers by Mormons (and their Paiute Indian mercenaries), apes "Schindler’s List" in hopes of creating a Christian Holocaust picture. Read full review
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