Seven Days in Utopia – Review

Film, Reviews, Theatrical Reviews, Top Story

Faith-based film delves deep into golf and not God

Golfer Luke Chisholm (Lucas Black) is having the round of a lifetime. Going into the 18th hole in his first professional tour event, Chisholm has an epic breakdown of golf infamy. Shooting a 14 on a single hole, taking him from a round leading 66 to an 80, Chisholm seemingly self-destructs in front of the entire world. Driving home in the middle of the night, he crashes his car in a small Texas town. Stuck in Utopia, TX, for a week, he takes up former tour pro Johnny Crawford (Robert Duvall) on a challenge. He has seven days to work with the young golfer to work on his game and through golf find a better viewpoint on life. And he’ll need it for the Texas Open in a week, where his redemption lies.

That’s plot of Seven Days in Utopia, a faith based film that isn’t as preening and pretentious as most faith-based films usually are. The usual downside with films that appeal to the faith-based crowd is that there’s an intended audience that’s being appealed to exclusively. As such those not in the faith-based cinema viewing crowd tends to get excluded from being able to enjoy a film like Fireproof, for example, because that film’s strong message about marriage and family gets lost in what could be seen as an over-bearing message about faith. The message of faith is there but it’s not as overpowering as it could be.

This is a film that has learned the lessons of faith-based movies like Facing the Giants which are meant for a specific audience and that audience only. This is a film for the faith-minded set but it’s strong enough that the character lessons and the transformation of Luke Chisholm from flailing prospect with a life spiraling out of control into someone walking a better path on the course and in life.

Utopia counters what’s usually a faith-based push in terms of story by making it much more about a journey to finding the path as opposed to having that path shoved onto you. Duvall and Black make for an interesting combination in the traditional student/teacher in the Hollywood sports formula. Having already worked together in Get Low, which both were quoted as having loved working with one another, the two have an easy and strong chemistry. They have a tremendous dynamic together; Black is confident enough as an actor and strong enough in the role that he doesn’t shrink in the shadow of one of acting’s last major stars. But it’s not in his acting where Black gives the film a large chunk of its credibility; it’s in his golf game.

Reputed to be a scratch golfer in his private life, Black has all the tools of an amateur golfer trying to make the professional circuit as Chisholm. How he carries himself and swings his clubs, as well as lining up shots on the course, come from someone who knows how to play as opposed to someone taught how to move and act by someone who does. Black gives the character credibility early on by how he swings, et al, and it’s easy to see it’s not a camera trick. If he couldn’t golf, or Matt Russell had to use camera tricks to hide it, the film would fall flat early on and never recover.

Chisholm’s character is also given a strong arc, as well. A child prodigy at the game, winning is all he’s known and his father (Joseph Lyle Taylor) hasn’t been helpful giving him a strong viewpoint on how to view the game. Their fight at the end of his epic disaster of a round is the latest in a series of events that have hampered the younger Chisholm on the golf course. As Johnny helps to retrain him on how to view the game his teachings become a parable as well on how to live his life. Getting rid of the lies and deceptions he’s told himself about the game, and himself, Luke’s life is at a fork in the road. How he handles it will help determine the path he walks on the rest of his life and Johnny, with a bit of guidance into the word of God, is there to teach him in the ways of every great cinematic teacher.

From Clint Eastwood in Gran Torino teaching the ways of construction and manliness to Mr. Miyagi teaching Daniel-San in Karate and car cleaning, Johnny Crawford is there to teach Luke about golf and God (though not necessarily in that order). Chisholm’s character path, with flashbacks to pivotal moments in his life that shaped how he came to be at that moment, gives us a deeper perspective on Johnny’s lessons and how they relate to Luke’s life.

Seven Days in Utopiamay not be the finest golf film ever made, nor is it perhaps the best faith-based film ever made, but it’s perhaps the best combination of both.

Director: Matt Russell
Notable Cast: Robert Duvall, Lucas Black, Melissa Leo, KJ Choi, Deborah Ann Woll, Joseph Lyle Taylor
Writer(s): Rob Levine, Matt Russell and Sandra Thrift based off the novel “Golf’s Sacred Journey: Seven Days at the Links of Utopia” by Dr. David Lamar Cook