"Christian Films" can be a gamble in the story department, especially the small ones. Many are sweeter than milk and honey, and they sound a bit more like a preacher's sermon than a film. This one was actually kind of a surprise. The premise is a teacher taking a job in a different country, dealing with a class of mostly unwilling high school students from a very different cultural background. No, this isn't To Sir, With Love, but it isn't that far off from being a remake.
Other than the strong similarity to a great film, there are some interesting strengths. Chief among these is the filming location in Taiwan. It is really beautiful, with some absolutely stunning shots included. Some of the directorial choices of what NOT to show were interesting as well. The movie launches very quickly into the premise with a short description of why the lead chooses to travel halfway around the world to teach a bunch of kids she can't really understand, and there are characters who are significant to the story who barely appear on screen at all. One other thing that is almost entirely missing is subtitles of the Mandarin dialog. This puts you very much in the place of the teacher who can't speak the language, but it is still presented in a way that you know exactly what is happening.
To my delight the film does also steer clear of the "Christian Film" tendency to make movies into a kind of sermon. Instead, it chooses to show people who are Christian being people with everyday problems and failings which don't get solved just because of simple faith.
The weaknesses are mostly minor. Of course, it certainly isn't original. There are a couple of sound issues as well. Since you don't get subtitles, some of the translation you do get is from smartphone translation apps, which can be a little hard to follow. More distracting is that the film rushes a bit through the ending, and in the process takes the safe route to tie everything up in a nice happy package. This is a little cliché, be not as bad as your average Hallmark movie. Overall, it is just an enjoyable film.
