The Good Lie

Amid a wave of mediocre faith-based films comesThe Good Lie, a movie that doesn’t sacrifice craft for meaning.
 
Starring Academy-Award winner Reese Witherspoon, The Good Lie illuminates the plight of Sudan’s “Lost Boys” in a way that stirs compassion and provokes thought and action. The first half hour of the film is set entirely in Sudan within the horrors of that country’s Second Civil War, which ended in 2005 and resulted in millions dead and thousands orphaned, including about 4,000 who came to the U.S. as refugees and immigrants.
 
Witherspoon plays Carrie, an employment counselor who tries to help three of these displaced people—Mamere (Arnold Oceng), Jeremiah (Ger Duany), and Paul (Emmanuel Jal)—obtain jobs and get settled in Kansas City. 
 
The gifted actor anchors the movie, but her character doesn’t save the day for her new African friends. She lends a helping hand, but in the end they must persevere, or not, on their own. Their friendship transforms all involved.
 
As Carrie becomes more involved in their lives, so does the viewer, inviting the question, “What is our responsibility to refugees?” Most of us can’t affect politics in Sudan, but anyone can show a newcomer how to use a phone and fill out forms. The quiet faith of the Lost Boys inspires and gives hope as we wonder how we would be changed through welcoming strangers to a new land. On disc now. (Warner Bros.)