Mountain Meadows Massacre:September Dawn film

This page is based on an answer to a question submitted to the FAIR web site, or a frequently asked question.

Question

Does the film about the Mountain Meadows Massacre accurately portray the historical events?

Response

September Dawn is an ill-informed and poorly-done piece of propaganda.

It is true that a group of Mormons, under the influence of local leaders, orchestrated a cold-blooded massacre of men, women, and children on 11 September 1857. The film's claim that this behavior was typical of Mormons, insistence that Brigham Young ordered or orchestrated the massacre, and its uncritical reliance on the account of John D. Lee are grave flaws.

Furthermore, claims that the Church continues to "suppress" the truth are false. Those wishing resources on the historical facts behind the Mountain Meadows tragedy can click here. A recent article in the Ensign (the Church's official magazine) is available here.

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Articles on the film and Mountain Meadows Massacre generally:

• Ben Arnoldy, "Ahead of 'September Dawn,' Mormon Church revisits dark period," Christian Science Monitor (24 August 2007). off-site

Critical reaction

Non-Mormon critics have also realized how biased, sensationalistic, and poorly done the film is. A sample of media quotes about the film (quotes are by author's last name):

Authors A-D

• "Zero stars.... If the Western genre is struggling, it's because of terrible movies like this one." - Jeffrey M. Anderson, Combustible Celluloid (24 August 2007). off-site

• "Director Christopher Cain...paints a damning, one-sided portrait of Latter-day Saints in this irresponsible, ham-fisted morality tale that plays off our cultural ignorance of the Mormon religion...The events surrounding the killings are historically cloudy, but not according to this film...He stops short of calling Osama bin Laden a Mormon sympathizer, but maybe that'll be on the DVD." - Ty Burr, Boston Globe (24 August 2007). off-site

• "It's not torture porn; it's massacre porn...the pic is ultimately less interested in understanding its Mormon characters than in demonizing them..." - Justin Chang, Variety (). off-site

• "September Dawn was made primarily as a history lesson, to bring to light an atrocity that took place 150 years ago, and to underscore the parallels between the religious fanaticism of the past and the religious fanaticism of the present.... And here's where things get a bit dodgy. The film clearly pins responsibility for the massacre onto Brigham Young (Terence Stamp), the head of the Mormon church and the Governor of Utah at that time; but historians...say it is unclear whether Young was directly involved. If the film was assuming his responsibility for dramatic purposes, and using it to explore an even larger theme, that would be one thing; but instead, Young's alleged responsibility is itself the point that the film wants to hammer home.... What makes this portrayal even more questionable is the stark contrast the movie draws between the Mormons and the settlers.... Those who want to know what really happened...are advised to look elsewhere." - Peter T. Chattaway, Christianity Today (24 August 2007). off-site

• "...the project has the appearance of melodramatic sectarian propaganda.... The film feels less like historical drama than a venomous religious tract printed on celluloid." - Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star Tribune (23 August 2007). off-site

Authors E-H

• "Zero stars...The vast majority of the members of all religions, I believe and would argue, don't want to kill anybody. They want to love and care for their families, find decent work that sustains life and comfort, live in peace and get along with their neighbors. It is a deviant streak in some humans, I suspect, that drives them toward self-righteous violence, and uses religion as a convenient alibi...There isn't anything to be gained in telling this story in this way. It generates bad feelings on all sides...The Mormons are presented in no better light than Nazis and Japanese were in Hollywood's World War II films. Wasn't there a more thoughtful and insightful way to consider this historical event?" - Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun Times (24 August 2007). off-site

• Shot in a style that might be termed Americana gravitas, September Dawn has the ham-fisted lyricism of political ads and pharmaceutical commercials. - J. Hoberman, The Village Voice (21 August 2007). off-site

Authors I-L

• "September Dawn presents a ham-fisted cautionary tale of religious fanaticism that would have been hooted out of even 19th-century theaters as melodrama of the most lurid kind.... Such ham-fisted earnestness does no one any good, least of all those who believe there's a big difference between historical fact and emotional screed." - Chris Kaltenbach, Baltimore Sun (24 August 2007). off-site

• "The film and its website come with references and citations galore, yet confusing points abound.... When the movie isn't doling out ham-fisted history, however, it gives us magnificent vistas of a pristine prairie...." , Frank Lovece, Film Journal International (24 August 2007). off-site

• "Cain has co-written and directed a film that only the most bigoted of Mormon detractors could enjoy. Most viewers, if any are willing to part with their money or time, will simply laugh derisively.... [Director Cain] has created questionable history and boneheaded drama.... Thanks to a cheap production...and even cheaper thinking, anyone who has seen the movie knows that there’s nothing to discuss." - Dan Lybarger, eFilmCritic.com, (24 August 2007). off-site

Authors M-O

• "Imagine a half-baked remake of “Schindler’s List” by Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and you get the idea." - Wade Major, Boxoffice.com (24 August 2007). off-site

• "Religious bias clouds Dawn...The obvious bias in this scenario is so flagrant as to be cartoonish...[the authors] are anything but subtle with the film’s message which can roughly be summed up as Mormons=bad, Protestants=good... Though Young’s involvement has never been established, speculation about such has been a favorite pastime in anti-Mormon Evangelical circles for years, which is where this film was seemingly hatched. Not only is co-writer Schutter an avowed Evangelical, but the film also reportedly enlisted as advisor Brigham Young descendent Sandra Tanner, a practicing Evangelical who, with her husband, runs a Utah-based ministry that specializes in attacking the Mormon Church...Not that “September Dawn” is likely to stir much of a controversy, anyway. Apart from a handful of Bible Belt markets that will devour it like red meat, the self-distributed picture is more likely to be greeted by Mormons and non-Mormons alike with exceeding apathy – more offensive for its slapdash storytelling than its willfully slanderous bias." - Wade Major, Boxoffice.com (24 August 2007). off-site

• "...disturbingly awful..."September Dawn," written by an evangelical Christian, may be the worst historical drama ever made...it trivializes one of America's ugliest and least understood events." - Jack Matthews, New York Daily News (24 August 2007). off-site

• "When watching the screen depiction of a historic event in which 120 people were murdered, giggling is not the appropriate response. But 'September Dawn,' director Christopher Cain's drama set during the Mountain Meadows Massacre, is deserving of derision." - Sean Means, Salt Lake Tribune, (24 August 2007). off-site

• "It has the chilling certitude of the self-righteous.... This misguided 9/11 allegory and fictionalization of that history utterly demonizes the perpetrators of that massacre and those who may have given the orders.... Every religion, when scrutinized by a skeptic, is open to mockery. Tune in to South Park if you want satire that ridicules, sect by sect, all comers in the world of religious zealots especially Mormons. But September Dawn isn't mockery. It's practically a call to jihad.... We can probably count the days until this shows up for sale on fringe Christian TV channels, its virtues trumpeted by some minister or other marketing his or her version of 'The Truth.' There are facts here...but there's the unmistakable air of evil about this enterprise, and not just an atrocity the Mormon church caused to happen 150 years ago." - Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel (24 August 2007). off-site

• "Cain and Schutter want so desperately to frame their story with clear-cut heroes and villains that they steamroll over much of the nuance that not only leaves the events open for interpretation but also shows the futility of retrofitting the world into absolutist terms of black and white, us and them. Cain and Schutter instead prefer to simply bang the 'Mormons are freaky' drum just a little too hard and insistently." - Mark Olsen, Los Angelas Times (24 August 2007). off-site
• "There will be many who will see September Dawn as an anti-Mormon film. And there's no question that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is portrayed in the film as a cultlike religion of fanatics. Mormons no doubt will feel personally attacked, and they should." - Richard Nielson, The Arizona Republic (24 August 2007). off-site

• "The point of the picture appears to be the blunt mockery of the Mormon culture, but surely “Dawn” would be far more controversial if it didn’t try so hard to be raw and unpleasant. [Director Christopher] Cain has turned the Mormons into baby-eatin' Nazis to suit his argument, parading around these black-clad, chin-bearded, testicle-slicing gunslingers without any thoughtful consideration. To Cain, the Mormons were hulking, borderline insane fundamental gorillas who flung excrement at anyone daring to besmirch the name of Joseph Smith.... It’s a trashy, tasteless, and ridiculous film about a serious event in prairie history, eliciting laughter instead of education." - Brian Orndorf, eFilmCritic.com, (24 August 2007). off-site

• "‘September Dawn’ not worth seeing...the director gives a rather one-sided perspective on a highly debated issue. It’s hard not to notice director Christopher Cain’s bias towards the Mormon treatment of “gentiles”...This is my biggest problem with the film...Instead of keeping the film close to history, Cain bases his tale on a questionable 27-page confession, and subsequently portrays the Mormons as animals and zealots...." - Norris Ortolano, The Advocate (25 August 2007). off-site

• "'September Dawn' oozes biased zeal...uses tragedy to bludgeon home its anti-Mormon agenda...a pedantic, cable-TV-caliber melodrama that bullies the audience into accepting its rather slanted, selective agenda...The filmmakers intimate that the murder of Smith was more or less justified, and frame the Mountain Meadows bloodshed as the final culmination of the sect's extremist arrogance. It makes for a sordid display" - Craig Outhier, The Orange County Register (23 August 2007). off-site

Authors P-S

• "The jarring MTV-style filmmaking is so distracting and the 'messaging' so unsubtle that after two long hours you find yourself leaving the theater with a massive headache, wondering when you started to hate Mormons." - Brett Register, Orlando Weekly (23 August 2007)off-site

• "a solemn package of historical fiction and an exceedingly old-fashioned one at that. It is also quite controversial among Western historians and the Mormon community...The principal story line is anything but verbatim history, and the screenplay is the weakest aspect of the film." - Luke Sader, Yahoo News (24 August 2007).off-site

• "...the clunky, heavily skewed means by which this tale is presented is nothing short of egregious, with its Mormon characters demonized with such laughable gusto, and its Christian victims cast in such a holy, noble light, that the project quickly feels less like an attempt at historical truth-telling than like shameless anti-Mormon propaganda.... This cartoonish demonization persistently seems tied to a religious-political agenda." - Nick Sager, Slant Magazine (20 April 2007). off-site

• "No stars...'SEPTEMBER Dawn" succeeds completely at failure; the unified incompetence of its writing, directing and acting suggest a man who manages to be on fire and drowning at the same time..." - Kyle Smith, New York Post (24 August 2007). off-site

• "D minus.... Clearly “September Dawn” is constructed as an anti-Mormon diatribe disguised as a historical narrative.... Like most 'historical' pictures, [it] has serious problems in historical terms. But in this case they're exacerbated by the simple ineptitude of the filmmaking." - Frank Swietek, One Guy's Opinionoff-site

Authors T-Z

• "But it can't shake the implication that it's some sort of attack piece on the Mormon religion and, in turn, conspiracy theorists may believe, Mitt Romney's presidential campaign. Some dialogue negatively likens Mormonism to Islam and paganism. Cartoonish scenes detract from the film's plausibility, including Mormon characters' referral to Brigham Young as 'the Mormon god on earth,' and a group of Mormons chanting 'blood atonement! blood atonement!' over and over as though it were a softball rally cry.... 'September Dawn' is a stirring love story that dabbles uncomfortably close to hate." - Phil Villarreal, Arizona Daily Star (23 August 2007). off-site

Conclusion

If readers are aware of quotes about the film not available here, they are encouraged to contact FAIR.