REVIEW: As I sat in the screening for Breakthrough the only words, I was able to write down in my notepad were “TOO CLOSE”.

John Smith (played by Marcel Ruiz) is an average 14-year-old boy living an average boy’s life. He’s on the basketball team at school, he might just have a crush on a certain girl, and his mom is a bit over protective. He has the typical issues a lot of teen boys have. Maybe not everybody likes him because he looks a little different. After all this is Missouri and an olive-skinned boy in a midwestern Christian school is not the norm. But John has a good group of friends and a loving family.

As you may have surmised, I would call this a faith-based film even though it has not been promoted as such. Not because its preachy, cause its not. But because it takes faith and only faith to believe the impossible when all that is in front of you says it cannot be done. Joyce Smith (played by Chrissy Metz of This Is Us) had faith when no one else did. On January 19, 2015 after spending the night at a friend’s house, John and his two best friends decide, even though it was cold, to go out and have some fun. Little did any of the boys know what was about to happen and how it would not only change their lives but the lives of many in their community.

As the movie title tells you, the boys’ breakthrough the ice on lake St. Louise in Saint Charles. John’s two friends barely make it out. The real struggle begins when the EMT’s are called in to help. They get the other boys out but 15 minutes in and John is no where to be found. As you may know from the trailer, this is a miracle story but there is so much more involved. It’s not just about a mother’s faith or a child’s fate. This movie will take you through the stories of all who were touched in one way or another by John’s story and his situation. John was blessed from the beginning as the adopted child of Joyce and Brian Smith (played by Josh Lucas). He was blessed with a Pastor (Topher Grace) that although being a little too hip for Joyce’s taste was there when it was needed most, blessed by a school that knew how to pray, and all those involved in the efforts to rescue John. Chrissy Metz was recently quoted as saying that she was drawn to this film “especially in a time like this”… “believing in miracles myself, I could just relate”. She played Joyce with such feeling. Josh Lucas as the grieving father, who lacks the blind faith that his wife has. is so relatable. I have to tell you that one of the “lighter” scenarios in the movie is the relationship between Joyce and Pastor Jason Noble. Topher Grace plays the hip progressive Pastor trying so hard to be relatable to the younger members of his congregation too good!

I started this by saying that the only words on my notepad were “Too close”. There were too many similarities between John and Joyce’s story and mine and my eldest son, Dexter. At 13 years old, my boy went through a medical crisis that started with his heart stopping, his organs failing and this mother praying. Dex is 26 today and just came back from his deployment in Iraq. Prayer and a mother’s faith can bring about miracles. There are those out there that will dismiss this movie as some Christian film and ignore it. But give it a chance especially if you need to see that miracles are still happening today.