Sony’s ‘The Forge’ movie: absent father, resentment, respect
By Rusty Wright
Ever experience family conflict? Wish your dad had been more involved in your life? Longing for love and respect for yourself, or for your children? Is resentment churning in your gut? You’ll likely connect with key characters in Sony’s The Forge movie.
This Kendrick Brothers film follows their successful War Room, Courageous, and Overcomer movies in emphasizing the positive difference that character and faith can make in everyday life and society. The Forge opens in U.S. theaters and on five continents.
Becoming what kind of man?
Isaiah Wright, age 19, loves basketball, video games, and doing as he pleases. A high school grad with no future plans and living with his single mother, he needs a jolt to move him toward living responsibly. His mom starts charging him rent. While job seeking at a sports enterprise, he links up with company president Joshua Moore, who takes an interest in helping Isaiah mature into manhood.
Moore’s plan involves individual time together helping Isaiah map his personal goals for the kind of man he wants to become. It includes small group gatherings with other men to learn, encourage, and grow.
The film depicts diverse people and interests. There are Blacks, Whites, and Hispanics. Athletes and geeks. Young men and young women. Hairdressers and corporate titans. It portrays family and work relationships, teamwork, and volunteer service. There are plot twists, humor, fun, excitement, inspiration, and crises.
Father absence
It’s well known that father absence has detrimental effects on family and society. The National Fatherhood Initiative reports that father absence links with increased risks of poverty, behavioral problems, prison, crime, teen pregnancy, abuse, substance abuse, and more.
You might suspect that father absence can generate lots of resentment. Isaiah and his mentor Joshua Moore grapple with this and its faith implications. One early follower of Jesus advised, “Get rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, harsh words, and slander…. Instead, be kind to each other, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God through Christ has forgiven you.”
In other words, if one has accepted divine forgiveness by faith, it makes sense to forgive others.
Mentoring and friendships
The Forge‘s emphasis on mentoring and friendship building character to better navigate life applies not only to the young and inexperienced but also to the successful. It reminded me of a longtime friend’s journey from outward success to relational collapse, restoration, and coaching others in friendship building.
Allen Morris is a prominent real estate developer who has emerged from personal and family crises to encourage others. He and his wife saw a marriage counselor – his trusted friend – who then became romantically involved with Allen’s wife, torpedoing their marriage.
Counseling and mentoring led him to focus on his inner life, to honestly face his fears and failures, and to develop close friendships with other men who could help him process his emotional development. Today, he’s quite transparent about all this and is happily remarried. His All In Leaders nonprofit organization helps “entrepreneurs, executives, and high achievers” discover blind spots, manage their inner lives, explore their spiritual journeys, and develop peer friendships to foster consistent growth.
The Forge dramatically portrays the difference that mentoring and close friendships can make in successful life development. Much needed in our too-often-disconnected world.
Rated PG (USA) “for thematic elements.”
www.TheForgeMovie.com U.S. opening August 23 International release info (5 continents)
Rusty Wright is an author and lecturer who has spoken on six continents. He holds Bachelor of Science (psychology) and Master of Theology degrees from Duke and Oxford universities, respectively. www.RustyWright.com
Copyright © 2024 Rusty Wright
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