Saved!

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Saved!
Image:Saved! movie poster.jpg Saved! poster
Directed by	Brian Dannelly
Produced by	Michael Ohoven, Sandy Stern, Michael Stipe, William Vince
Written by	Brian Dannelly, Michael Urban
Starring	Jena Malone, Mandy Moore, Macaulay Culkin, Patrick Fugit, Eva Amurri, Martin Donovan, Mary-Louise Parker
Distributed by	United Artists
Release date(s)	January 21, 2004
Running time	92 min.
Language	English
Budget	~ US$5,000,000
IMDb profile

Saved! is a 2004 teen comedy film involving elements of religious satire. It was written by Brian Dannelly and Michael Urban, and directed by Dannelly. It stars Jena Malone, Mandy Moore, Macaulay Culkin, Patrick Fugit, Eva Amurri, Martin Donovan, and Mary-Louise Parker. Saved! was filmed at Clayton Heights Secondary School in Surrey, British Columbia but set in suburban Baltimore County, Maryland. Michael Stipe of the band R.E.M. is one of the film's producers.

Tagline: Heaven Help Us.

1 Plot
2 DVD
3 Musical
4 Trivia
5 See also
6 References
7 External links

[edit] Plot

At the beginning of the film, Mary (Jena Malone) has "been Born Again [her] entire life." She is beginning her Senior Year at American Eagle Christian High School near Baltimore, where she is a member of the Christian Jewels - a "girl band for Jesus" - with her Fundamentalist Christian friends Hilary Faye (Mandy Moore) and Veronica (Elizabeth Thai). She also has a "perfect Christian boyfriend", namely Dean (Chad Faust).

Two weeks before Summer Vacation ended, Mary was playing a game with Dean where they would tell each other secrets underwater. On his turn, Dean says that he thinks he's gay. Mary, shocked by an obviously unexpected revelation, hits her head on the pool's ladder when she resurfaces. A builder working nearby immediately jumps in to save her after Dean slips on the tiles. While being rescued, Mary has a vision in which Jesus says that Dean needs her, and that she must do all she can to help him.

Mary tries to 'help' Dean by getting him to do more heterosexual acts, such as kissing her and squeezing her breasts, but they don't seem to make much headway. Hoping for a sign, Mary goes to the shooting range with Hilary Faye, who has "a spiritual solution for everything." Hilary Faye talks about how Christian girls need to protect themselves; but if all else fails, Jesus could still restore their "spiritual and emotional virginity." Mary then believes that, if she were to lose her virginity trying to 'save' Dean, Jesus would make her pure again.

Despite Mary's efforts, on the first day of school, when she and the other Jewels stop by his house to pick him up, Dean's parents reveal that they found gay pornography under Dean's bed and that he was on his way to Mercy House, a Christian treatment center. Mary tells her friends and Hilary Faye's handicapped and cynical brother Roland (Macaulay Culkin) about Dean's 'perversion'. After recieving an understandably horrified response, she makes them promise to keep it secret.

As they get to school, Cassandra, played by Eva Amurri and the only Jewish person at the school and a rebel against the school's belief and disciplinary systems, establishes her dislike of Hilary Faye by throwing a cigarette at her. During a pre-assembly reunion, Mary also meets Patrick (Patrick Fugit), a skateboarder and the son of Pastor Skip (Martin Donovan), who has recently been with his mother in South America doing missionary work. Mary is immediately attracted to Patrick, thinking that he was the only boy at school who didn't look like a NASA employee.

Soon after Mary learns she is pregnant via a home pregnancy test. Doubting the results, she heads to Planned Parenthood, here she is spotted by Roland and Cassandra.She would have the baby after graduation and birthday. So the good news would be that she would not have to go to Mercy House or give up her baby.

Mary loses faith in Christianity, and is ostracized by Hilary Faye and her other friends. The Jewels quickly replace her with a previously unknown girl, Tia (Heather Matarazzo). Pastor Skip asks the Jewels to help Mary regain her faith, which to them meant trying to kidnap and exorcise her. On her way home, she runs into Patrick who offers her a ride home and asks her out, to which she responds that she is not dating right now.

While at school for Christmas know one notices that she is pregnant except for Cassandra and Roland because they see her leave Planned Parenthood. For that reason Cassandra teases her. Mary then goes into the bathroom and cries while there Cassandra comes in and confronts Mary there she says yes she is pregnant and they began to bond. They ditch the rest of school and go maternity shopping with Hilary Faye's credit card along with Roland and Cassandra. Later they run into Patrick and Hilary Faye. Pretending to want to get saved, Cassandra distracts her while Mary and Patrick slip away. They almost kiss but end up not doing so. The next day, Cassandra sticks a piece of rotten bacon in Hilary Faye's locker (which causes a stench so bad around the area that Hilary Faye covers her face) and tells Hilary Faye that she has decided to devote her life to Satan instead of getting saved.

On Valentine's Day Mary debates giving Patrick the Valentine she made, and gives up when Hilary Faye gives him one, afterwards she finds one from Patrick in her locker. In that scene it is also revealed that Pastor Skip is not fond of Patrick dating Mary and is dating Mary's mom, Lillian (Mary-Louise Parker), unknown to either of the kids.

On Easter Sunday, Hilary Faye invites Cassandra and Mary to join them for lunch. Cassandra and Mary turn the request down, and a potshot from Hilary results in a fight. Then Roland lets them in on a secret about his sister, and shows them a picture of an ugly Hilary Faye when she was a little girl. The next day at school Cassandra and Hilary Faye clash again. Hilary Faye reports them to Pastor Skip, who puts them on the prom committee--chaired by Hilary Faye--as a punishment. Later that day in computer class, the ugly picture of Hilary Faye as a child winds up as the wallpaper of the desktops of the system. Hilary Faye is humiliated and tries to tell Pastor Skip that Cassandra and Mary are responsible, but he doesn't believe it. That night Hilary Faye prays on how to get back at the outcasts.

The next day, someone sprays Satanic graffiti on the school. Mary and Cassandra are automatically suspected given their nonconformist status. Spray paint is found in their lockers. Cassandra is expelled, but it's unclear what happens to Mary. In the midst of the search in Mary's locker Mary's sonogram is seen by a teacher she decides not to tell on Mary and then hides it in her folder.The teacher says nothing is there but accidentally drops the sonogram on the floor, revealing her pregnancy.Hilary Faye and the other Christian Jewels are watch from upstairs and see the sonogram. Murmuring that she is she pregnant they then say they can't believe they were friends with her. Roland see them and says "You have everything Hilary Faye why you have to ruin their lives {Cassandra his girlfriend and Mary his friend}. Pastor Skip insists that Mary be sent to Mercy House, or else he will break off the relationship with Lillian. After giving it some serious thought, Lillian decides to send Mary away because she is to young, the baby needs a father and a mother, and it would ruin Mary's life but the real reason is she doesn't want to break up with Pastor Skip. This causes a fight with Mary and her mom.

Cassandra and Roland set up a plan where they get Mary a dress for prom and get Patrick there to take her as his date. At the prom, Hilary Faye is revealed to have spray-painted the school in an attempt to frame Mary and Cassandra, and that she planted the spray paint in their lockers. In a fit of rage over being exposed as a hypocrite, she crashes her van into the school's effigy of Jesus. Meanwhile Dean and the others from Mercy House show up there after swiping the program's van. He finds out Mary is pregnant, which is okay with him. Pastor Skip insists that Dean and company return themselves to Mercy House, telling Dean that he isn't welcome at American Eagle because he is gay. Dean responds that Jesus still loves him even though he is gay.

The movie concludes with Mary and Dean's baby being born and Lillian, Patrick, Dean, Mary, Roland, Cassandra, and Dean's boyfriend, taking a picture together and Skip waiting outside debating whether to come inside, and Mary saying how she changed her mind and went back to believing in God.

[edit] DVD

A DVD version of the film is available with a director's audio commentary, as well as commentary by Jena Malone and Mandy Moore; theatrical trailer, access to deleted scenes, and some bloopers.

[edit] Musical

In spring 2007, it was announced that Playwrights Horizons was developing a musical version of the film, with music and lyrics by Michael Friedman and book and lyrics by two-time Olivier Award nominee John Dempsey (The Witches of Eastwick) and Obie Award winner Rinne Groff (The Ruby Sunrise), for a spring 2008 premiere. ^[1]The only casting that has been announced is Celia Keenan-Bolger as Mary.^[2]

[edit] Trivia

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The article could be improved by integrating relevant items and removing inappropriate ones.

Although American Eagle's denominational affiliation is never revealed, the school appears to have a distinct charismatic flavor (though Channel Guides describe it as Baptist). Several students (including Mary) raise their hands during prayer and worship, and Pastor Skip calls speaking in tongues "God's love language." Also, Hilary Faye tries to cast a demon out of Mary.
Anne Hathaway was originally cast in the role of Hilary Faye but was replaced by Mandy Moore when funding fell through as Hathaway was due to start Ella Enchanted.
At the first assembly of the year, Cassandra fakes speaking in tongues, but actually bares her breasts. During this scene, Moore and Malone revealed in the commentary that the original script called for Hilary Faye and Mary to speak in tongues as well. This was written out of the script, but a shocked Hilary Faye does "interpret" Cassandra's "tongues." Moore also reveals that the woman who was training them to speak in tongues gave them phrases to repeat that would sound like charismatic/Pentecostal-style tongues if spoken rapidly, including "she bought a Hyundai," "me tie my bow tie" and "untie my bow tie."
Rolling Stone claims that the film was a strong social commentary and didn't depict all of the Christian characters negatively. An example of one of the film's "good" Christians was Patrick, who according to Slant magazine, held his Christian faith proudly, and was "sweet". ^[3]
Jonathan Larson, author of the Broadway musical RENT, wrote the book, music, and lyrics for a musical satirizing the religious right in the 1980s called Sacraimmorality, later renamed Saved!
The song the band plays at the prom is "We'll Inherit The Earth" by The Replacements from their 1989 album Don't Tell a Soul.