Jesus Camp

2006 "America is being born again."
7.4| 1h24m| PG-13| en| More Info
Released: 15 September 2006 Released
Producted By: A&E IndieFilms
Country: United States of America
Budget: 0
Revenue: 0
Official Website:
Info

Jesus Camp is a Christian summer camp where children hone their "prophetic gifts" and are schooled in how to "take back America for Christ". The film is a first-ever look into an intense training ground that recruits born-again Christian children to become an active part of America's political future.

Genre

Documentary

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Jesus Camp (2006) is now streaming with subscription on Prime Video

Director

Heidi Ewing, Rachel Grady

Production Companies

A&E IndieFilms

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Jesus Camp Audience Reviews

Noutions Good movie, but best of all time? Hardly . . .
ShangLuda Admirable film.
InformationRap This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.
Kimball Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.
TheBlueHairedLawyer Whether you go to see this film as a non-believer or an Evangelical Christian, one way or another you're going to be enlightened, and not in a Biblical sense. We get no narration throughout telling us what to think of Becky Fischer's "Kids on Fire" youth summer camp, nobody trying to drag us to hate these people, and yet from just interviews alone of the parents of these children, it quickly becomes apparent that these kids aren't being prepared for living on their own in the real world, and also that the preaching of Fischer and her cohorts is much more politically motivated than faith-based. Is it fear? Is all this desperate reaching for traditional Christian values just a response to the uncertainty of the times? Frequent references are made after all to Islamic terrorism (this film lives in the shadow of 9/11 without outright talking about it), the dissolution of the American family, global warming theories and modern pop culture influences, like Harry Potter and ghost stories. It soon becomes blatant that these parents are paranoid and trying to save their children from every horror that they feel is destroying the values that they hold dear. We also get a particularly grueling view of these kids being made to protest against abortion (they think it's the murder of babies but don't have any concept of what a "baby" by definition of law, ethics of science actually is - and how do these ten-year-olds even know what abortion is?), being made to give propaganda pamphlets to people on the street and getting berated for having good, clean fun if it isn't related in any way, shape or form to God. No matter your views politically or religiously, the film raises a very important question - what kind of people do we want our children to grow up to be, and is it really moral to use them as a pawn and mold them into what we wish we could be? All through it these kids continually hear from the Pastors and their parents, "God loves you", but we never hear any of these adults say "I love you no matter what you do in life". We hear Becky Fischer say "kids are so usable in Christianity" and "I can go up to a playground of kids and lead them to the Lord in a matter of minutes", but we never hear her say "I care about kids". There's a lot of hypocrisy throughout, especially displayed towards those in the nation who happen not to be Christian. The adult Evangelicals in the film show nothing but disdain for these people unless they've been "saved", which shouts out at all viewers to ask themselves, "what does it truly mean to be united as a nation?"
planmanosagogo This is a film everyone should see. Think of it as a horror film, but with the events actually occurring. The plot concerns a group of children being brainwashed by right-wing fundamentalists into becoming dangerous fanatics supporting the political right's doctrines of hate, fascism, and xenophobia. As an anarcho-socialist and atheist I strongly recommend this as a demonstration of how right-wing views are inherently dangerous to everyone. An antidote to all of you who fell for the lies expressed in such cinematic rubbish as 'god's not dead'.
Lomedin This documentary starts with a fat woman (likely obese) talking about not being a lazy and fat Christian and to do some fastening. The rest of the film shows us the same type of nonsense and contradictory facts being babbled and acted by those so-called Jesus lovers.The documentary basically follows the life of this woman called Becky (or something like that), the summits she hosts, the bible camp she organizes and the children she, along with other adults, brainwashes and indoctrinates.It also gives evangelist leader and Bush administration adviser Ted Hagard some of the airtime he loves so much. Not as much as he loves drugs and having sex with young lads, as it was discovered later. 1% of the film is given to a Christian radio show host to express how crazy is the behaviour showed in the other 99% of the documentary. That is, a Christian uttering how absurd other christians are.Leaving aside the significance of this, the problem I find in this production is the lack of real criticism (or reason) of what is showing us. I'm aware that the documentary pretends to tell us how the fat woman and other delusional people are trying to mold children into what they are themselves, although it is annoying to have to simply cope with 90 minutes of stupidity and have to swallow it all raw without much of a word muttered clearly against it. Save the already mentioned radio host believer.Now, these people are obviously either delusional or stupid beyond comparison. Probably both. Unfortunately, this is nothing new and the world is literally littered by millions and millions of individuals who think that there is an invisible being up in the sky who loves us all but will damn you to eternal torture if you don't follow his orders. Go figure. I have to wonder what all this belief is doing in the quantum world when it comes to mind over matter. There are other millions who believe that there are more than one of these up there, although the 3 big monotheistic religions are the most dangerous and absurd ones. We all know America is a world on its own and the cradle of nut jobs and fruit cakes, however things have been getting out of hands for a while now. I am not afraid of schizophrenics, psychopaths or child molesters like the people in the documentary, yet I can see how this is very, very scary. The kids showed in this film are unmistakably mentally scarred, traumatized or otherwise mind-damaged for life thanks to the idiocy of adults who find children -quoute- "usable" for their religions. However, I don't feel sorry for the kids. They will grow up and shall bring destruction and even more stupidity upon this Earth. If any pity should be felt, all my sympathies go to the near-future planet and the non-human inhabitants who will have to suffer the consequences of these highly disturbed people and their legacy, all for an invented set of absurd ideas called christianism copied and twisted from an even older set of myths. If you are serious about learning how to fight back the imbecility of the world, I recommend Religulous, The Virus of faith or some other Richard Dawkins or Christopher Hitchens work, for example. At least with those you see some active opposition to the "enemies of reason".As a final message to all those evangelists, anglicans, mormons and related crazy folks: if Jesus of Nazareth had been a real historical figure, he would nail himself to the cross once he knew what a big bunch of lunatics say and do in his name.
paul2001sw-1 To those of us who do not live in a part of the world where it is resurgent, evangelical Christianity appears a strange thing, one part madness, one part scam, and one part cover for vicious conservative nationalism. But the standard picture doesn't altogether prepare you for 'Jesus Camp', in which we follow the efforts of an apparently true believer to teach/indoctrinate the next generation. What we see is startlingly close to child abuse: indeed, it's hard to consider how this could not be considered abuse (in the purest sense) if it wasn't being done in the name of the established religion of the day. Quite how little of the doctrine is grounded in the words and spirit of the New Testament is also shocking, as is the way the kids learn quickly to behave as expected, and to express the same intolerant attitudes as their elders. If you hadn't thought of Christianity as a contest to prove who loves God the most before, then think again. If this documentary has a fault, it's only that it delivers the goods upfront: the first 20 minutes effectively summarise most of what follows. Still this is a pretty powerful denunciation of attitudes not just misguided, but close to pure evil, yet cloaked in false layer of suburban orthodoxy.