Review of the Movie "Stone"

Recently, I watched a newly-released-to-video movie called Stone.  I want to first say, as I do in any movie review I do, if you do not want the details of the movie spoiled, if you plan to watch it, then do not read this until after you've watched the movie.  Furthermore, I want to state that this movie is an adults-only movie.  Not only is there a violent stabbing scene, numerous calling down of curses from God and many profane words, but there is sexual content and partial nudity that is better off not seen by anyone.  

Wikipedia calls the movie a "box office bomb," stating that it brought in only a third of its production budget.  I do feel that this is a disappointment, because it has a message that most in our nation really need to grasp.  I have observed, though, that though I and a minute few others actually get something out of movies, most only seek to be entertained by the violence, sexual content, the looks of the actors and actresses themselves, etc. and do not really pay attention to the underlying MESSAGES that so many movies reveal.

The movie's four main characters are about-to-retire Jack Mabry, Jack's wife Madylyn, 20-or-30-something Gerald "Stone" Creeson, and his wife Lucetta.  The movie starts out with a non-introduced young Jack and Madylyn Mabry and their young daughter.  The woman carries her daughter to her bed upstairs and kisses her so that she can continue her nap.  She sits on the bed for a minute staring at a fly buzzing around the screen of the open window.  She then goes downstairs and tells her husband something to the effect of, "You're keeping my soul in a prison.  I'm leaving," to which the non-introduced Jack responds by jumping out of his chair and storming upstairs.

Obviously worried, Jack's wife runs up the stairs after he's gone up, shouting after him.  She finds him in their daughter's room, hanging his daughter out the window and threatening his wife that if she leaves him, he'll drop their daughter.  She says she won't leave and pleads for him to bring their sleeping daughter back inside.  After he lays the girl back on the bed, the wife hurries to the window and slams it shut on the fly, which kills the latter.  I think the fly's death is something most won't even think much about, but I find it interesting that it was included.  A creature with a nasty job, viewed as a nuisance was killed by the woman who saved her daughter from being killed.  It was if it was a just substitute.  The man had removed the screen, so the fly then had the opportunity it wanted to leave, but it must have swarmed around the room.  Before it could finally be free, it was killed.

Then the movie moves to the present, showing scenes of an Episcopalian (Protestant Christian) Jack Mabry and his wife attending church services; scenes of Jack, a corrections officer, in his office talking to Gerald Creeson; scenes of Jack and Madylyn in their home, often with prayer and devotionals at meal times, it being clearly evident that Madylyn is serious about her faith, whereas Jack is not so much; scenes of Jack driving in his car, usually listening to radio with Christian broadcasting; scenes of Lucetta calling Jack or meeting Jack; and scenes of Lucetta visiting Gerald in prison.

Toward the beginning of the movie, Jack meets with Gerald in Jack's office.  Gerald has served eight years of eleven sentenced for arson.  He's available for possible parole, so Jack is reviewing his case.  Gerald demands to be called "Stone," because that is what everyone who knows him calls him.  He talks with an attitude, and his language is heavily laced with profanity.  His hair is in rows of tight braids.  He tells Jack that he's ready to get out, and Jack asks him whether it's because he's reformed, to which Gerald says that he's paid time, and he's ready to get out.  He has not really gone through any change for the better, though he does say something interesting to Jack.  He inquired why he had to be in the prison and why Jack could be free, and Jack said that he hadn't "broken the law."  Stone (Gerald) basically said, "You mean to tell me you haven't done anything wrong in your life?"

Stone calls his wife from prison and urges her to talk to Jack and do anything she could to get Jack to give Gerald a good report so that he could be released.  Lucetta more or less stalks Jack, calling him at home and stopping him outside his workplace.   He finally agrees to meet privately with her.  She plays the sweet and seductive role very well.  Long story short, she persuades him to go to her house, and she gets him drunk and has sex with him.

Meanwhile, Stone is having a difficult time being in prison.  He desperately wants out.  He goes to the prison library and starts sorting through religious literature.  Poor guy.  There are so many things from which to pick, he's not sure where to start.  He finally chooses a pamphlet on a religion Zangkugor or something.  I can't remember the name of it, nor do I know whether it's a real religion or made for the movie.  It teaches a doctrine of karma and reincarnation and that humming a certain way will help you get in a certain zone where then you can hear a  natural sound, like a bee buzzing and find harmony or God in it.

It is not within the scope of this review to deeply discuss such religions as Zangkugor or whatever it was called, and the true God does not call everyone to understand truth during this phase of his seven-step plan of salvation for mankind.  But, the main point is that Gerald did go through a spiritual change.  He finally felt guilty for burning his grandparents' house down.  He started asking questions like, "What is forever?"  He cleaned up his speech tremendously.  It was no longer filled with profanity, and he spoke more intelligently.  He got his hair out of braids (certainly not to say that braids are sinful).

At the same time, Jack feels convicted of his adultery with another man's wife and clearly feels very uncomfortable around both his own wife and around Gerald.  The tables have turned, and Jack is the one whose language is filled with profanity and yelling, where Gerald sits calmly and asks Jack questions out of concern, which only enrages Jack more.  Jack is obviously a tormented soul, and Gerald is at peace.  He said it didn't matter now whether he was in prison or out.  Gerald's spirit was free within him, where Jack's spirit was in tormenting bondage to his sin, because he really did believe there was a God but wanted to deny it in order to justify his sin to himself and so to avoid confessing his sin and apologizing to those he wronged and repent--change, get on the right track.

Jack's wife is visibly hurt but also disgusted with Jack's behavior.  She has her womanly instincts and wise discernment and asks Jack whether there is anything he needed to tell her.  He's very short and profane with everyone with whom he has contact now.

Jack decides he wants to change the good report on Gerald, even though now it should be clear to a wisely discerning judge that Gerald has true grounds to be released.  He's truly gone through a spiritual change, serving in liberty under some law in which he believed.

Madylyn leaves Jack, after burning their home down and getting away with it (the same crime Gerald had done for other reasons), and goes to their daughter's home.  The daughter says to her mother that she is so surprised that she waited so long and didn't leave a long time ago.  She said, "I tried once..." as she stares into another time, not answering her daughter's inquiry, "What happened?"  We're left to wonder whether Madylyn tells her daughter the story about her father hanging her out the window.

It also appears that Gerald left his whorish wife Lucetta.  I find it interesting that the name Lucetta was chosen for her character.  Her name means "light," but she's very deceptive and seductive, only appearing as a person of light.  In one scene she showed to be at work at a daycare or school, out on the playground with young children, and she was very patient and gentle-spoken.  She was sugary sweet when seducing Jack.  In truth, she was full of darkness.  She verbally expressed to Jack, upon being asked, that she did not believe in God.  She made her own good and bad, delighting in what she saw right in her own eyes.

Jack is driving down a street one night and happens to see Gerald walking.  He stops, takes a gun from his car, gets out of the car, and chases Gerald down.  He has him in a place of darkness and starts cursing him and pushes him up against the wall of a building.  He presses the barrel of the gun to Gerald's forehead and falsely accuses Gerald of ruining his life.  Gerald is calm throughout the whole scenario, which pisses off Jack even more.  He threatens, "You don't think I'll kill you?!"  Gerald calmly replies, "No, I don't."  He's right, as Jack eventually takes the gun away and leaves.  Jack (meaning "man") has an exceedingly sinful heart, but he does not want to break the PHYSICAL law of the land and so be imprisoned physically.  Nevertheless, he's in SPIRITUAL bonds, spiritually imprisoned, in bondage to his sin. 

A person can be free in God's eyes while in physical bondage (in prison), and a person who is physically free can be in spiritual bondage.  There are many who care about what man thinks and so will put on outward show of being righteous, but they are not fooling God who judges the heart and mind.  Many do not want to humble themselves and repent of their sins.  They have hearts of stone.  Gerald started out as "Stone," and he was indeed hardened.  But, he underwent a spiritual transformation, and his heart softened.  In the end, it was Jack who had the stony heart and chose to remain in tormenting spiritual bondage, rather than humbly confess his sins and repent.  There are many who sit in buildings made by man, imprisoned who are spiritually free, and there are many, many more who, although physically free, are imprisoned by their sin and their refusal to free themselves by humbly repenting.

At the age of 18 I was charged with credit card fraud across interstate lines.  When I was 20, I was served papers by the Secret Service and a U.S. marshal and summoned to court a U.S. district court to enter a plea.  I entered a plea of guilty.  I had shown a complete turnaround.  In the end, I was not convicted of the crime, though I was guilty and had pled guilty.  I received GRACE upon my repentance.  Many looked down on me with great judgment for one of the lesser sins of the Ten Commandments, one of the only sins that did not require the physical death penalty if physically transgressed.  Those same people were guilty of greater sins and great sins of the heart, sins of which they do not repent.  But, those physical sins and those greater sins of the heart are not punished by the law in place by man of this land.  Though those same people claim to be Christians, they care more about the law of man and what man thinks than what God thinks.

Which are YOU?  Were you a Stone that is now changed, or are you a Jack who is physically free and looked upon through the eyes of man as "a good person" but are in spiritual bondage to your sin and "wicked" through the eyes of God?