Rate this Movie 
How does the Tomatometer work
Reviews Counted: 53
Fresh: 7
Rotten:46
Average Rating: 3.4/10
Consensus: With its jarring editing, dull love story, and silly dialogue, September Dawn turns a horrific historical event into a banal movie.
Runtime: 1 hr 51 mins
Genre: Dramas
Synopsis: This independently produced drama is based on historical fact: In 1857, Mormon settlers, in an area near Cedar City, massacred 120 people bound for California. Jon Voight plays Jacob Samuelson, a paranoid religious zealot whose initial... [More]
Starring: Jon Voight, Terence Stamp, Trent Ford, Tamara Hope
Director: Christopher Cain
The villainous turns by Jon Voight (as a hard-hearted Mormon bishop) and Terence Stamp (as a bloodthirsty Brigham Young) would have been more fun if they weren't part of such a clumsy campaign to lay this tragedy at the church's doorstep.
Drama may benefit from attention to history, but history doesn’t always make for good drama.
Contriving a faux Romeo and Juliet romance as a point of entry for the audience shows how unimaginative the filmmakers are, and how blandly and uninvolving it plays shows how fairly clueless they are in going about their game plan.
For all the guns fired in the film, [director] Cain aims the largest one at his foot—and pulls the trigger again and again.
The workmanlike craftsmanship of Cain's filmmaking almost (but never quite) smooths over the ham-fisted way he conceives the story.
Top Critic An already thin veneer of historical truth wears off fairly quickly in this surprisingly dull and melodramatic low-budget western.
It's a toss-up as to whether September Dawn is more offensive as history, as allegory or simply as lousy self-important filmmaking.
With its complete lack of empathy for early Mormons and simplistic rendering of historical figures, September Dawn is that rare movie that actually deserves whatever condemnation might come from religious groups.
The director's overreaching attempts at social commentary with hackneyed devices weaken the veracity of the source material and leave the film open to interpretation as propaganda.
Often gripping and fascinating, it's bound to create waves of controversy.
An asinine chunk of Mormonsploitation that mixes historical fact with fictional romance and bald-faced anti-Mormon prejudice.
For all its cinematic weaknesses, I left the theatre weeping. “Now you know how I feel when I see holocaust films,” my Jewish husband told me gently as he wiped away my tears.
Religious and thematic issues aside, September Dawn is well-crafted as a revisionist Western with a message.
The maudlin, grotesque western September Dawn apes Schindler’s List in hopes of creatinga Christian Holocaust picture.
Top Critic What could have been a galvanizing and all-too timely account of religious fanaticism turning violent has instead been reduced to the banal level of an Romeo and Juliet-type love story.
While we should always be suspect of history served up with popcorn, this is a story worth telling
January 22, 2008:
I Know Who Killed Me, Norbit, Daddy Day Camp Lead Razzie Noms
No awards season -- even a strike-tainted one -- would be complete without the Razzies, right? Of course not. And that's why we've thoughtfully assembled all of this year's... More...
August 26, 2007:
Box Office Guru Wrapup: Audiences Still Crazy for McLovin
Booze and babes were still in high demand as the teen sex comedy Superbad ruled the North American box office for the second straight weekend despite the arrival of a handful of... More...
August 25, 2007:
Released at perhaps the worst time for presidential candidate Mitt Romney, this graphic Western sheds light on a shameful, long-suppressed chapter in the annals of Mormon history. 
More...
August 23, 2007:
Box Office Guru Preview: War Leads Army of New Releases
Action stars Jet Li and Jason Statham face off this weekend in the new crime thriller War which leads a flood of new releases pouring into North American multiplexes trying to... More...
| Tomatometer Percentage | Movie |
|---|---|
 93% |
Iron Man |
| 85% |
Forgetting Sarah Marshall |
 50% |
Sex and the City - The… |
| 52% |
Leatherheads |
| 12% |
Made of Honor |
| Tomatometer Percentage | Movie |
|---|---|
| 35% |
You Don't Mess with the Zohan |
| 18% |
The Happening |
| 75% |
Paranoid Park |
| 93% |
The Visitor |
| 71% |
Stuck |
Comment
