Faith healer Jonas, his manager Jane and their staff of around 30 people stop at Dustwater, Kansas when one of their trucks breaks down, and thus decide to open a show to take money from the people, while they are at it. Sheriff Will is against it, since drought and high unemployement already took a huge toll on the agriculture community. A lot of religious crowd shows up in his tent, while Jane feeds info to Jonas on stage about certain people, for him to give them comfort. Jane and Will start a relationship, while Jonas flirts with Marva, a waitress. When one teenager with a handicapped leg, Boyd, touches the crucifix on stage and throws away the crutches, and is able to walk again, Jones realizes a real miracle occured. Jonas thus quits his job as a preacher and takes a ride from a stranger heading to Florida, just as it starts to rain.
"Leap of Faith" is a strong humorous drama that tackles the American social phenomenon of faith healers and preachers on stage, featuring one of Steve Martin's best performances, but it is also one of those movies that are ruined by a misguided ending. The film has a gorgeous cinematography and several serious moments, but also a knack for witty dialogue. Most of these come from the protagonist, faith healer Jonas, who uses all sorts of tricks and ploys to manipulate people around him, though some refuse to be fooled. For instance, upon arriving to the small Kansas town, Jonas goes to a diner and encounters a sceptic waitress, Marva, and does a trick to show her the importance of faith: he takes off his watch, claiming it was a gift from his mother when he graduated seminary, and then throws it away on the floor. He then jumps on it and crushes it, picking up the broken watch in front of a startled Marva: "See Marva, nothing has value without salvation." The screenplay by Janus Cercone rightfully depicts Jonas and his group as scammers and frauds, contemplating about the tendency of people to agree to be fooled, willingly, in the name of religion. Several tricks are revealed, such as the one where Jane feeds Jonas info via an earpiece about certain people in the audience, for instance about a man having backpain or another having a feud with his neighbor, so that Jonas can claim divine inspiration in knowing them. But privately, he is fittingly shown as a cynic.
Before going on stage in front of the crowd, he wears a fancy suit and gives Jane advice: "Always look better than they do". In the middle of the show, when the church choir is singing, there is a great cut to the crew in the office afterwards, just counting money they earned that evening. It says everything. In one of the best moments, Jonas even goes on an empty stage and talks to the crucifix: "Hey boss. Remember me? Got a question for you. Why did you make so many suckers? You say, 'love never endeth.' Well, I say, love never starts! You say, 'the meek shall inherit the earth.' And, I say, the only thing the meek can count on is getting the short end of the stick! You say, 'is there one among you who is pure of heart?' And, I say, not one!" The movie would have even worked even better as a satire, but even in this edition, it has a good balance between drama and comedy. It all works, all until the disingenuous ending that negates everything the movie stood for up to that point. In that forced Disney happy ending a boy throws away his crutches and walks in front of the crowd, but it betrays the bitter realism of the story up until that point: religious miracles simply don't exist, it is all just a form of fraud to exploit the gullible for their money, and thus the tonal differences of the beginning and the ending of the film clash badly with each other. If there had been a really black humorous twist to this ("Monk" episode 7.9., "Mr. Monk and the Miracle", comes to mind), it would have worked, but by presenting this fraud business as suddenly something genuine, the movie inevitably loses its courage and sharpness to give the audience a truly deserved bitter ending.
Grade:++
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