One Man's Treasure (2009)

Although the plot is somewhat hokey, I rather enjoyed One Man's Treasure because I got an insight into the Latter Day Saints young missionaries and their shared experiences. For what it is supposed to do it is an effective teaching tool about the faith. Having actually had a couple of Mormon missionaries over at my house a couple of weeks ago, One Man's Treasure was a nice insight to their private lives.Three pairs of missionary young people stumble on to a cryptic message in a locked cellar of their new home in Bristol, Pennsylvania. Two pairs are men and one pair are young women and all are intrigued by this message which says there is a great treasure to be found at the end of the search. The primary focus is on two of them who just don't cotton to each other. Darin Southam and Charan Prabhakar just don't get along, Southam is the head of the household and one who believes in the rules, Prabhakar who is from Pakistan has a more laid back attitude. During the course of the film we learn about both of them from the others and the experience of the hunt binds them closer. My favorite scenes in One Man's Treasure are the domestic ones, the missionaries in an around their own house seeing the various rules of their faith they deal with. I wasn't converted by any means, but it was a great insight into the Mormon missionary experience.As for the treasure and the experiences that make Prabhakar and Southam the people they are you have to watch the film. And if you are not an LDS member and are willing to approach it with an open mind I think you can enjoy this film on a certain level. It's a lot better than some of the Christian evangelical films I've seen and reviewed.

It is good that we are allowed to express personal opinions, never have I seem one so biased against a new movie than the first published here in IMDb.One Man's Treasure is a real enjoyable movie and the young actors/actresses do a superb job (okay I can fault the false English accent used by one of the cast, but that is a typical American perception and so wrong) I have purchased every one of the Producer JOHN LYDE'S movies, he started with real short movies first and they have all been so well produced and they have introduced many good young actors, most of them not being full time professional.If you purchase the DVD which I recommend, there is a making of feature and John Lyde is totally honest of how limited the budget is on a production like this, but you would never know unless you are going to be over critical. By the way I am not a member of the LDS Church.Well done John.

Just totally, stupendously terrible. Never watch this film. It's incredible to think that good money was spent in the making of it. There's a full orchestral score, which sounds like it was played live - that can't have been cheap! Disastrous is too generous an adjective. The acting is worse than "School Play," the script is choke-on-your-tongue guff and the direction is just bloody appalling. Why did I watch this at all? Because I was practically catatonic after two days on the sauce, and it was hilarious! Probably not the intention of the film-makers, but that's what got it the single mark out of ten.Advise a long, cold shower after giggling like a mindless child at this dross.

I haven't seen this movie yet but I've found an interesting review from Mormon Times here:http://www.mormontimes.com/arts_entertainment/movies/?id=5973================================ (This review contains spoilers) ================================'One Man's Treasure' absorbing flick By Sharon Haddock - Mormon Times Monday, Jan. 26, 2009"One Man's Treasure" certainly isn't a perfect film. The acting is a little stiff, with lines delivered somewhat woodenly, and there are a few problems here and there in the logic behind the story development. But it's well-done enough that when the picture on the screen started to break up and digitize, people in the audience were quite unhappy.Everyone wanted to know what happened and see the cast of missionaries find the treasure.This Candlelight Media movie -- created and directed by John Lyde -- tells the tale of a half-dozen missionaries sent off to serve in a wasteland area.One uptight elder about to finish his mission (played by Darin Southham) is majorly disappointed to be assigned "to babysit" three other missionaries in a place no one had been for years. His reaction to his plight is to tighten the reins and attempt to force his laid-back companion, played ably by Charan Prabhaker, to strictly obey the rules and meet a minute-to-minute regimen.He has no time for nonsense, yet he joins in the game left to the elders by the last missionaries to serve in Bristol, Penn. (or American Fork/Salt Lake City judging by the signs for Tracy Aviary and the American Fork Library).Sister missionaries played by Chantel Flanders and Shalaina Fotheringham and the companionship made up of Dustin Harding and Paul Hunt round out the cast which spends P-Day (a remarkably long and sunshiny P-Day) tracking down clues and finding the hidden treasure.The story is entertaining and, again, absorbing enough that it's very disconcerting to be pulled off-track not only by a scratched disc but by the occasional cinematic mistake.For instance, the town of Bristol, purportedly a desolate, trash-laden hamlet, suddenly has a beautiful tree-lined cemetery and gorgeous sunlit streets.Missionaries dressed in clean white shirts and beige sweaters can somehow climb into dusty basements and under a stage to emerge without a smudge.A tarantula crawls about in the dark and spooky Pennsylvania basement. Not sure tarantulas are native to Pennsylvania, but it's good video.And the elders somehow expect there to be food on the open shelves in an apartment that's been abandoned for years.A British missionary used to driving on the left side of the "motorway" drives without disaster on a Pennsylvania freeway.Clues left here and there -- stuck in books, door jams and behind mailboxes -- are intact.(It's amazing as well that elders who have only just arrived in a new area, know where the bakeries and cemeteries are and can get there on their bicycles in pretty good time.)There's also time along the path to the treasure trove to, let's see, change a flat tire, help an old man move a bunch of cement blocks, fix an overheated car engine, set up 200 chairs in a cultural hall, find a select bakery, tour a bird aviary, change clothes, do some laundry and teach a discussion -- all in a single afternoon.But if one can put aside these logistical problems, it's a pretty good movie.It won't ever make the big time, but for a light comedy and a story with some spiritual value, it's all right.