Marjoe
Sarah Kernochan & Howard Smith
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Plot Summary
The Academy-Award®-winning MARJOE is the ferocious and extraordinary chronicle of a firebrand evangelical preacher who wholeheartedly and humorously exposes himself as a fraud. An evangelist prodigy at the age of four, the film captures an adult Marjoe as he recounts how he discovered the seductions of the 60s counterculture and dropped out of preaching, only to return later, using his swaggering bravado, to woo Pentecostal audiences out of their offerings. Directors Howard Smith and Sarah Kernochan follow Marjoe as he embarks on his "farewell to the faith tour," revealing the secrets of religious hucksterism. MARJOE is both a fiery baptism in the cynical waters of faith healing and evangelical fervor and a fascinating profile of a man who went from hellfire to hellraising.
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Rotten Tomatoes Movie Reviews
TOMATOMETER
100%- Reviews Counted: 5
- Fresh: 5
- Rotten: 0
- Average Rating: 7.9/10
Top Critics' Reviews
Fresh: For many complicated reasons, fundamentalist Christianity in America doesn't look the same today as it did in 1972, when Marjoe won the Academy Award for best documentary.
Fresh: In 1972, Sarah Kernochan and Howard Smith's Marjoe was enough of an eye-opening sensation to make news of itself and Oscar winners of its creators.
Fresh: A portrait of interior disconnect between authentic faith and cynical disillusionment.
Customer Reviews
Fascinating
Marjoe Gortner first gained attention at the age of four as a child evangelist. He dropped out of that life in his early teens, but returned in his early twenties, touring the Pentecostal circuit of revival meetings, held in local churches or tents. As he admits in this documentary, he had never believed in God, and he was becoming increasingly unable to stomach what he was doing for a living. He decided to do one last tour, with a film crew in tow, exposing himself as a fraud, and casting considerable doubt on evangelists in general. The film shows him fully in character during the revival meetings, utterly convincing as a hellfire and damnation preacher. In between, he gives candid interviews to the documentary crew, explaining how the evangelism business works, and the kind of tricks it uses to manipulate the congregations. This is still fascinating to watch thirty-six years after it was filmed. Old school tent revivals of the kind we see here may be less common, but this sort of religious hucksterism is alive and well.
Whatever became of Marjoe?
I remember seeing Marjoe Gortner on the "Dick Cavett Show" in the '70s. With the Acdemy Award - winning documentary, Marjoe re-invented himself as a "Tommy" - meets - "Jesus Christ Superstar," celebrity with a record contract and a role in the movie-length pilot for the TV series, "Kojak." As quickly as his presence burst on the scene, by the '80s it evaporated. Truth really is stranger than fiction and "Marjoe" is a strange, timeless tale of America's fascination with youth, salvation, money and power.
Is this the same movie
This movie is about 35 years old, not something released in 2007. Docs have come a long way since this profile
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