Natey & Katy: At the Movies

Surprise Saturday: Rocking with One Vision and Finding Faith in "The Forge"

Season 4 Episode 66

"Send us a Text!"

What happens when you combine a night of legendary music and a thought-provoking film? Join me on a rollercoaster of emotions as I share my exhilarating experience at the One Vision Queen Tribute Concert featuring Marc Martel at the Durham Performing Arts Center. Feel the magic of Freddie Mercury's timeless hits brought to life by Martel's uncanny vocals and the electrifying atmosphere that filled the air. This date night with my wife was nothing short of spectacular, and I'm excited to take you there with every beat and note.

Switching gears, we'll explore the powerful themes in the Kendrick Brothers' latest film, "The Forge." I'll dissect its compelling portrayal of Christ-like masculinity and provide an honest assessment of its impact on the landscape of Christian cinema. With a rating of 4.5 out of 6 stars, this film raises important questions about faith and values. Don't miss this special Saturday episode packed with music, movie reviews, and heartfelt insights.

Speaker 1:

Hey everybody, welcome to a surprise Saturday episode of Nadine Katie at the movies. I'm your host, nathan aka Nadie, of course, and on today's episode I'm taking a double feature, but it's not like any other double feature I've done so far. I will not be reviewing two movies. I'll be reviewing a live concert and a movie, both of which I did go to with my lovely wife. She will not be joining me for this episode, so let's get right into it. Here is a clip of the concert that we went to. Take a listen.

Speaker 2:

I want it all. I want it all. Stop it now. It's such a good time. All we hear is mediocre.

Speaker 1:

Everybody. We will. We will rock you. We are the champions. My friend, if you don't know the music, then who are you?

Speaker 1:

My wife and I went to go see One Vision, a Queen tribute with Mark Mattel at the Durham Performing Arts Center. I actually won these tickets when the Durham Performing Arts Center had an open house earlier this year and they gave away free posters and they had a wheel that you can spin and one of the prizes was free tickets. And at first I wasn't going to wait in the line because it was like crazy long. But then I thought to myself, hey, you know what? Sure, why not? So I waited in the line. A lot of people were spinning the wheel. Nobody got tickets. And before I got to the wheel I said, man, it would be really cool to win some tickets. And guess what I did? And I saw those tickets for this concert. My wife and I had literally just talked about wanting to go. They had the concert at Myrtle Beach the week after we were leaving from our family vacation, and so I won these tickets and I was super excited about it. And so we went to this concert and let me tell you right now, it was fantastic.

Speaker 1:

Now I know Mark Martel when he was in a Christian band and I remember hearing one of his songs and I thought he sounds just like Freddie Mercury. Well, years later he actually sang with the band Queen for a little bit, toured with them and did some of the singing in the Queen biopic, bohemian Rhapsody, and so now he goes on tour by himself with some band members and he does a full-out concert singing all the classic Queen songs. It was a fantastic time. If you ever have the ability to go see this and you're a Queen fan, you need to go. He does all the songs, all the classics. We are the champions. He also does other songs that you may not be necessarily familiar with and he also does some songs that maybe Freddie Mercury didn't necessarily sing, but he puts a Queen spin on it and it was just a really fun time.

Speaker 1:

You had people holding their cell phones out with lights, you had people recording. I recorded some of it. It was just a really, really, really fun time. So I would give the Queen One Vision Queen Tribute Concert a six out of six. I thought it was a perfect date night for my wife and I, a great time for us to be able to get out and just enjoy some classic music being sung by a fantastic, fantastic singer who seriously sounds just like Freddie Mercury. It is mind boggling how much he sounds like him. So let me move on to the film, because this is a movie review podcast, by the way. In case you forgot, take a listen to this movie that I'm going to talk about.

Speaker 2:

So, eventually, I learned to listen. It's embarrassing to think about it now, at 24, I thought I could figure out life by myself. I thought I could figure out life by myself, but when you fall on your face as many times as I did, you finally realize it's better to learn from the mistakes of other people than to continually make your own. Yeah, I get that. Oh, man, I used to get into arguments all the time, thought I looked like a big man standing my ground. Then my mother said something to me that I've never forgotten. She said you need to be more of a fountain than a drain, and you need to start giving more than you're taking. The more I thought about it, I was using people to reach my own goals without loving them at all, and that's the thought that I have for you today Adopt that mentality. Be a fountain, not a train.

Speaker 1:

This is the new Kendrick Brothers film. If you don't know who the Kendrick Brothers are, they are brothers who go out and they set out to make high quality Christian content and put it out in the theaters. This is another one of their movies. They've done movies such as Fireproof, courageous Overcomer, and now they have the Forge, and this is all about what it means to be a christ-like man. And in today's society, masculinity is being grossly defined by society, by the media, by politics, by everything, except where it was meant to be defined, and that is in Christ. So my wife and I again went to go see this movie, because we always try to go out and support Christian film.

Speaker 1:

If you've listened to the show before, you may have heard me say that I am not a big fan of Christian movies, and the number one reason I'm not a big fan of Christian movies is well, there's many reasons, but one of the reasons is because the acting isn't always that great. One thing I've really enjoyed about Kendrick Brothers movies is that the acting has come a long way. So movies like Fireproof with Kirk Cameron the acting in that movie was just awful, just going to be honest. The message was great but the acting was terrible. And also another thing I'm not a big fan of Christian movies is because they're not reaching the broad audience, the general audience. They're only telling a story that a Christian wants to hear, and and not necessarily a bad thing. But if you want to make a difference in the general audience, make movies that don't necessarily bash you over the head with a message. Another reason why I couldn't really enjoy this movie is because of the audience. We had a family in front of us whose kids were obviously too young to go to a movie and they were just, it was just loud and it was really hard to focus on the movie. That being said, again, kendrick brothers movies have come a long way when it comes to the acting. When it comes to the acting, when it comes to the storytelling, I thought it was a good movie. Obviously there's still cheesy moments. It's a Christian movie. There's going to be cheesy moments. But I just had a really hard time fully enjoying it, not because of the movie itself, just because the audience experience. And so it's really hard to review this movie, but I still want to talk about it because I did go see it recently and I wanted to put it in this episode.

Speaker 1:

It's one of those movies that I honestly want to try to go see again, maybe not necessarily in theaters, maybe if it comes onto a streaming service or something so I can just watch it in the quietness of my home. Because you don't necessarily have to see every movie in the movie theater, you just don't. And I don't think this is one of those that you have to go, unless you want to go and support Christian film, which again, is why my wife and I went to go see it. We do want to support that. We want Hollywood to know that we want more good quality, wholesome entertainment, and I would say that this fits the bill.

Speaker 1:

I will say that the young man who played the lead character, I thought he did a very good job with his acting, with his emotions, with his lines, with his dialogue delivery. I thought he did a great job all the way around, and so for that I would give the forge a 4.5, maybe a close five out of six stars, because it is a good movie. I want to give it another chance when I can just watch it by myself, maybe with my wife again, and just the quietness, and be able to actually focus on it, because I believe, again, I believe these types of movies are important, we need to go support them. And yeah, so that is today's surprise Saturday episode One Vision, queen Tribute and the Forge Six stars and 4.5 close five stars out of six. And you can listen to our first episode of September with Katie and myself as we talk about LA Confidential on Nadie and Katie at the movies Critics on the go, opinions start to flow.

Speaker 2:

Will it be a hit? We need to know Romance or action, comedy or fright. Stick with us and see what's funny tonight.

People on this episode

Podcasts we love

Check out these other fine podcasts recommended by us, not an algorithm.

Is THIS For Kids? Artwork

Is THIS For Kids?

Jonathan 'Bearded' Blevins and Katie 'MrsRuvi' Ruvalcaba
Film Bros. Championship Podcast Artwork

Film Bros. Championship Podcast

Throw the Knife Productions