In Family Movie Night
Section 1

The Producer Info: If you have never heard of  the Liken the Scriptures company, they produce gospel based movies in a musical format. They are not affiliated with any religion or church. They offer titles such as David and the Big Fish, Esther and the King, Daniel and the Lions, and other Bible based musical movies. They have chosen to offer movies from the Book of Mormon, too. Samuel the Lamanite happens to be a movie about a prophet found in the Book of Mormon.

Spoilers!

The Story: The movie starts off with a public school whose Christmas program was renamed to Winter Festival. The kids’ choir teacher was suspended because she refused to remove “Silent Night” from the program. A district administrator comes to take over the choir and tells the children that they had to remove their leader to avoid litigation.

One of the students, Amelia, went home and explained the situation to her father and the butler.

The butler begins to tell her of the Lamanite prophet, Samuel who bravely went to Zarahemla to preach to the Nephites. The Nephites, at this time in history, were wicked. In the movie, they sing “All is Well in Zion” while dressed in their finery.

You’ll see the wicked Nephites dressed in fancy clothes and thinking only of how to increase their personal fortunes at the expense of the poor. They do not listen to Samuel as he calls them to repentance and prophesies of Christ’s imminent birth. Samuel climbs on the walls of Zarahemla and prophesies of all that Lord commanded him to tell the people.

5 years after Samuel leaves, the citizens start talking about which of his prophesies came true and which did not. The leader of Zarahemla says that if you guess enough times, you are likely to be right some of the time. In comes Nephi, another prophet, reminding the believers that the time is at hand.

Nimrod, the leader, says that if the signs of the Savior’s birth do not happen by a certain date, all believers will be executed. Nephi prays for the deliverance of the Lord’s people from this terrible fate. He receives an answer and brings hope. He sings a song, “The Time Has Come,” stating that Christ will be born that night.

Nimrod gives the believers one last chance to denounce Samuel’s and Nephi’s prophesies. Just as Nimrod’s soldiers take aim, Nephi makes one last prophesy that Jesus will be born. As expected, the sun sets and the sky stays bright as noon day. The believers are spared.

The Ending: We then transition to the present, during the winter festival. While the choir sings Jingle Bells, the choir director enters and one of the chorus members begins singing “Silent Night.” She is gradually joined by the rest of the choir. The choir is kicked off the stage. The butler and audience starts singing. It is obvious that the people have learned to stand up for what they know is right.

Thoughts: My kids enjoyed the movie. The songs were great and touched us all. Even my two year old stayed in the room for the duration, which was 60 minutes. My four year old started singing the songs on his way to bed, even though it was his first time watching the film.

**UPDATE October 2016** My kids have watched this countless times. It was worth every penny.

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