lrtibbseash1 Its truly refreshing to see a teen movie depict a teenager trying to hold sex as a sacred act instead of giving it all as a "right of passage..." I really enjoyed the story even though it was creepy and corny in parts...Matt Vodvarka is a little too believable as the possessed stocker kid. I really wonder if he needs therapy in real life. I love the chemistry between Sara Simmonds and Jake McDorman. I thought the music was a bit over the top and made the film seem a bit cornball. I am not sure that the last scene of the movie was necessary it should have been edited out---it was just strange BUT... This is a great alternative to all of the "casual sex" movies out there so shamelessly marketed to Teens...

imaginarytruths Clearly a lot of care went into making this. Technical credits are solid, and most of the acting is at least competent. However, the script is a mess, and the editing is downright incompetent. Each character is a walking cliché that can be described with one adjective. The ending is simultaneously ludicrous and painfully obvious. While much of what occurs on screen is more than a little silly, the tone is uniformly somber throughout. There is almost no dialogue between the two lead characters, but we are treated to TWO lengthy montage sequences of them in "deep meaningful conversation." Yet we are supposed to believe that they are soulmates. There is NO insight into the lives of teenagers, and no serious or reflective discussion of faith. Mysteries (of the mundane rather than the spiritual variety) are brought up and then never explained. The sneering no-dimensional villain is taken out by a deus ex machina that's a cow.There is no sense of artistry or style. The music is repetitive and swells overdramatically even when nothing much is going on. Transitions are abrupt and jarring. Every time the film starts to get going, with a scene that's genuinely unnerving or beautiful or somewhat authentic, the moment is killed by a cut into numbingly clunky, meandering, and/or unaffecting drivel. And then there's the very last scene, which looks like something out of a soft core porn film.What kills me is that they had the material here to make a daring and original Christian film. Really deal with teenage alienation, moral choices and their consequences, the power of faith and love to save us from the very real darkness that inhabits everyday life ... but it's just not here.

gopher1122 This movie is great! As an independent film it stands out far from Hollywood pictures as one that actually has a moral standard! The great thing about the film though, is that morality is not the star of the show. The decision of the main character to remain a virgin until marriage (which, contrary to popular belief, is a GOOD thing) is of course discussed and is a part of her character, but she is by no means preaching from a soapbox, it's simply who she is.It is a love story with a lot of mystery and action thrown in the mix, and the love story happens to center around a virgin. Yes, love stories can be told without sex! This is also a very refreshing portrayal, and a more realistic one, than that of movies like "A Walk to Remember" where social recluse Mandy Moore tip toes around her school in a floor-length overall dress and goes nuts when she gets a new cardigan. In Echoes of Innocence, Sarah has real problems to deal with and does so realistically. She makes mistakes and she struggles with her faith.Considering the budget of this film, the quality of the final product is a modern-day miracle.Go see it. If not in theaters, get it when it comes out on DVD!

enragedmonkey I suppose this could be seen as a spoiler... however the poor script makes it hard to call it one because you can see everything the movie is going to throw at you from about the beginningI don't want to sound like I am just raving here. Remember high school health class? Remember those movies you watched in them. I liked those days when you would watch some corny movie in class about abortion or date rape instead of hearing some teacher drone on about it in obscure terms that turn the situation into some sterile subject to talk about in class. Well I paid to go to a theater and watch the baptist equivalent of a health movie, and it was not as fun to pay to watch such a thing.In all honesty, this movie is the worst movie I have ever seen. Let me start with the fact that the synopsis i saw before seeing it failed to mention that it was a Christian conversion film. Films with blatant objectives are always annoying but this one took it to a level I didn't know existed. Lets say you are down with the whole having scenes of movies being people reading bible passages to each other or having religion be displayed in a way that should be disgusting to anyone who actually holds the beliefs represented (which by the way are not even standard Christian beliefs but some strange skewed belief that is disgusting.)First off lets talk about acting. I am not someone who normally notices or cares about relatively bad acting. I also have liked when movies cast people that are actually about the age of the person they are playing in high school settings. However I don't think the actors they chose had even looked at the scripts before performing in the movie. The pauses were awkward and long. The Cinematography probably didn't help this feeling as it tended to look much like a TV show. The Cinematography of some WB TV show would stand alone as a reason to complain about the appearance of a movie, however this movie has another feature that gives it a great feel of film naivety. The exposure and lighting are horrendous. Every scene looks pretty terrible because there are random bright spots that shouldn't be bright or other amateur looking things. The technical aspects of the movie are worth cringing over but the story is not anything better. The plot is full of holes and is incredibly predictable. The story in brief is some girl who admires Joan of Arc begins to be made fun of for being a virgin in Jr. high. After being roughed up for being a 12 year old virgin she runs into the arms of a boy whom she falls in love with and makes a promise to marry so they can have sex in wedlock at the age of 18. Then in the present where she is 17 a new classmate arrives who is blonde just like the kid of her past and seems immediately interested in getting to know her. After 2 hours of the end twist being blatantly obvious he finally tells her on her 18th birthday and says he couldn't tell her before because he wanted her to be in love with the him of today not the 11 year old him. (which somehow explains why he became friends with her by saying you can't ask me anything about myself only i can ask you so i can write an article about your life!?)The bad guy character in the movie is also a blob of misguided symbolism, poor acting, and confusion. He is initially displayed as being a creepy creepy womanizing gun freak and his character stays this one dimensional the entire time. Unless you consider the fact that he suddenly acquires a demonic voice that seems to be trying to make the point that the bad you see around you is Satan's fault as he is here to ruin your life. The end leaves you confused, as to whether he was the devil, thinking that you must have imagined the lead girl being shot as she was fine in the next scene, and her friend that had been shot in the hand seemed to have wandered out into the woods after the incident even though i saw him collapse in the field earlier. Then he reveals that he is in fact the lover we all already knew he was and we get to know that if you lead a good monogamous life you do in fact get to have sex on bear skin rugs with fires in the background.