The Wager casts Randy Travis as an Oscar nominated actor whose career looks pretty bright. But Hollywood is a most fickle employer and just as things are in high gear it all starts falling apart.
That old adage of it never rains unless it pours sure applies to Randy Travis. He gets into a creative dispute with the director on his current film Bronson Pinchot and walks off. Then his leading lady Candace Cameron Bure won't get any kanoodling as per Randy's faith. And when Candy sees Randy with a little boy who is just there as part of a big brother program in his house, she jumps to all the wrong prurient conclusions. Randy's deeply religious Christian mother is dying and to top it all off he slugs a bottom feeding gossip columnist.
Lindsay Lohan in her best high living days wasn't getting dumped on as bad as Travis nor getting as much bad publicity.
In the end though an unseen power pulls Randy out from the depths and actually allows him to be a real life hero instead of a movie one. If you're a believer you know that God is finally answering his prayers.
The Wager purportedly about the perils of being a Christian in Hollywood certainly lacks quite a bit of verisimilitude. There's one scene in there where Pastor Matthew Barnett is preaching and tells everyone that prayer is better in solitude and quotes the Scripture toward that end. Apparently Tim Tebow never heard that message.
John Hagee the rightwing preacher from San Antonio also appears her delivering sermons on television as Travis seems to get nothing but religious programming when he turns on the tube. Travis has appeared many times in his church, boosting his ministry and Hagee is a part producer of the film.
The Wager will certainly resonate well on the Christian circuit, but for general audiences, they won't find it credible.
