![\"Fernsten](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/186\/2020\/06\/3_Men_in_a_River.jpg\")
<\/a>(Still photograph courtesy of gaffer Rhett Fernsten)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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***<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n How, you may ask, is the Interpreter Foundation\u2019s forthcoming two-part 2.5-hour docudrama, Undaunted: Witnesses of the Book of Mormon<\/em>, different from the Foundation\u2019s theatrical film, Witnesses<\/em>?<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Thank you for asking!<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Both Witnesses<\/em> and Undaunted<\/em> are parts of the same overall project, and the docudrama\u2019s production and release have long been intended to follow on the heels of the earlier film\u2019s run in theaters.\u00a0 Unlike Witnesses<\/em>, though, which focused entirely on Oliver Cowdery, Martin Harris, David Whitmer, the official \u201cThree Witnesses\u201d of the Book of Mormon, and Joseph Smith \u2014 it was hard enough<\/em> telling a story with four<\/em> protagonists \u2014 Undaunted<\/em> will bring in the official \u201cEight Witnesses\u201d along with several of those whom I like to call the informal or unofficial witnesses (e.g., Mary Musselman Whitmer and Josiah Stowell).\u00a0 Also unlike Witnesses<\/em>, Undaunted<\/em> will feature interviews with historians and others, both Latter-day Saints and non-Latter-day Saints, who will provide depth and background for the witness accounts.\u00a0 Furthermore, unlike Witnesses<\/em>, it won\u2019t be distributed primarily through theatrical screenings, although we\u2019re still exploring the best alternative methods of getting it out there to the public that we wish to see it.\u00a0 Certainly these will include DVDs and eventual streaming.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Undaunted: Witnesses of the Book of Mormon<\/em> will premiere on the evening of Friday, 4 March 2022, as part of this year\u2019s LDS Film Festival<\/a>, which is slated to take place at the SCERA Center for the Arts in Orem, Utah.\u00a0 Seating will be limited, and tickets are on sale now<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n ***<\/strong><\/span>.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n In other film news related to the Latter-day Saints, here are seven published responses \u2014 some positive, some negative, at least a couple of them with, umm, a bit of an attitude toward the Church \u2014 to a new Sundance Film Festival movie about young missionaries in Finland.\u00a0 The Mission<\/em> is an entry in the Festival\u2019s World Cinema Documentary Competition.<\/em>\u00a0 I hope to watch it later tonight:<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Filmmaker Magazine<\/em>: \u201c\u201cLDS Folk Are the Same Whether They\u2019re North Americans or Finns\u201d: Tania Anderson on Her Sundance-Debuting Doc\u00a0The Mission\u201d<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n The Utah Review<\/em>:\u00a0 \u201cSundance 2022: The Mission documentary balanced, enlightening, realistic chronicle of four LDS missionaries in Finland\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n Variety<\/em>:\u00a0 \u201c\u2018The Mission\u2019 Review: A Mormon Documentary In Which Travel Seems More Narrowing Than Broadening:\u00a0Bland and short on insight, Tania Anderson\u2019s debut feature offers a superficial look at young U.S. Mormons<\/a> doing missionary service in Finland.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n But Why Tho<\/em>:\u00a0 \u201cSUNDANCE 2022: \u2018The Mission\u2019 Is a Fascinating Dip Into Mormon\u2019s Missions\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n LDS Living<\/em>:\u00a0 \u201cUnprecedented documentary featuring missionaries premieres at Sundance\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n SlashFilm<\/em>:\u00a0 \u201cThe Mission Review: Mormon Missionaries Take A Life-Changing Journey In A Somewhat Stagnant Doc [Sundance 2022]\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n The Hollywood Reporter<\/em>:\u00a0 \u201c\u2018The Mission\u2019: Film Review | Sundance 2022:\u00a0Tania Anderson\u2019s documentary follows four young Mormons on their mission to Finland.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n ***<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Here\u2019s a thought-provoking piece, written from an unconventional angle, on wearing masks:<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cBeing pro-life demands sacrifice \u2014 for a pandemic, too: It is not asking too much \u2014 in fact, it\u2019s really the bare minimum \u2014 for those of us who believe we are justified in asking a woman to sacrifice much to preserve a life growing inside her body to inconvenience our own bodies by wearing a piece of cloth.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n ***<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Over the past week or two, for some reason, I\u2019ve seen several critics \u2014 disaffected former believers in each case, I think \u2014 declare that Joseph Smith\u2019s prophetic claims were motivated by a desire to avoid farm work.\u00a0 The claim has reminded me of a relevant passage in one of Hugh Nibley\u2019s books:<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Everybody says Joseph Smith was lazy because of the things he didn\u2019t do, but what about the things he did do? What good does it do to say that you, with your tiny routine of daily busywork, think another man is lazy if that man happens to accomplish more than ten ordinary men in a short lifetime? Joseph Smith\u2019s activities are a matter of record and they are phenomenal. You might as well claim that Horowitz doesn\u2019t know how to play the piano to a man who owns a library of Horowitz recordings, or that Van Gogh couldn\u2019t paint to the owner of an original Van Gogh, or that Dempsey couldn\u2019t fight to a man who had fought him, as to maintain that Joseph Smith was a lazy loafer to the historian who gets dizzy merely trying to follow him through a few short years of his tremendous activity.<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n I think this constantly reiterated unfailing charge that Joseph Smith was a raggle-taggle, down-at-the-heels, sloppy, lazy, good-for-nothing supplies the best possible test for the honesty and reliability of his critics. Some of them reach almost awesome heights of mendacity and effrontery when, like Mrs. Brodie, they solemnly inform us that Joseph Smith, the laziest man on earth, produced in a short time, by his own efforts, the colossally complex and difficult Book of Mormon.\u00a0 <\/b>(\u201cThe Myth Makers,\u201d\u00a0Collected Works of Hugh Nibley,<\/i> 11:144-45)<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n On that same subject, one or two of you might be interested in a couple of columns that I wrote quite a while ago for the Deseret News:<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWere Smiths workers or slackers?\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cDid Joseph Smith take the easy path?\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n