Machine Gun Preacher (2011)

Machine Gun Preacher (2011)
Children-In-Need meets Collateral Damage

Based on the real man Sam Childers, an American ne’er-do-well, who becomes a pivotal character in the Sudanese civil war.

Gerard Butler plays the aforementioned Sam, a hard-man biker with the inevitable bevy of tattoos, addiction problems, and trailer-trash violence. After one-too-many evil deeds, Sam finds God along with his endlessly patient wife Lynn (Michelle Monaghan) and sorts his feckless life out, becoming a successful building contractor. Then, during an influential speech in his church by a minister from Africa, Sam decides to travel over to the troubled continent to see if he can offer help, and maybe atone for his sins in some way.

Whilst there, Sam ignores the advice of others and travels into the war zone in the Sudan, where he discovers the widespread chaos and misery. Moved by the children who sleep on the streets (as it is safer than their home villages), Sam vows to protect as many children of the conflict as he can by building an orphanage. However, Sam’s efforts do not go unpunished by the rebels, who seek to continue their decade-old tradition of transforming the nation’s children into child-soldiers. Hence the film’s title, Sam takes up arms against the rebels, whilst doing God’s work for the kids.

An affecting and moving film, Machine Gun Preacher offers a war movie with a strong personal journey. Butler’s performance of Childers is excellent, making the character seem more complex than some born-again Hick with a halo, and explores the issues with his violent approach to humanitarian work with welcomed depth. In places the story does still seem too heroic, but the overall effect is very engaging, and the film works well to bring attention to the atrocities still occurring in this troubled land.