{"id":1222,"date":"2007-11-20T02:33:00","date_gmt":"2007-11-20T02:33:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/2007\/11\/hes-not-the-messiah-hes-a-former-child-actor\/"},"modified":"2007-11-20T02:33:00","modified_gmt":"2007-11-20T02:33:00","slug":"hes-not-the-messiah-hes-a-former-child-actor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/2007\/11\/hes-not-the-messiah-hes-a-former-child-actor.html","title":{"rendered":"He&#8217;s not the Messiah, he&#8217;s a former child actor."},"content":{"rendered":"<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC \"-\/\/W3C\/\/DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional\/\/EN\" \"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/TR\/REC-html40\/loose.dtd\">\n<html><head><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><\/head><body><p><a href=\"https:\/\/1.bp.blogspot.com\/_MwnH1kpbPRM\/R0K7Fp46vnI\/AAAAAAAAA1o\/_DAPrfpMzOw\/s1600-h\/runningwithscissors.jpg\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\"><img decoding=\"async\" style=\"cursor:pointer;cursor:hand\" src=\"https:\/\/1.bp.blogspot.com\/_MwnH1kpbPRM\/R0K7Fp46vnI\/AAAAAAAAA1o\/_DAPrfpMzOw\/s400\/runningwithscissors.jpg\" border=\"0\" alt=\"\"><\/a><br><span style=\"font-family: georgia\">Back in 1998, a child actor by the name of <a href=\"http:\/\/www.imdb.com\/name\/nm0189200\/\" target=\"_blank\" class=\" decorated-link\" rel=\"nofollow\">Joseph Cross<\/a> appeared in three films that, to put it mildly, did nothing to make me a fan of his.  He might very well have been a good kid to hang out with, but his performances in <i><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/gp\/product\/0767812743\/petertchatta\" target=\"_blank\" class=\" decorated-link\" rel=\"nofollow\">Desperate Measures<\/a><\/i>, <i><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/gp\/product\/B00001IVEI\/petertchatta\" target=\"_blank\" class=\" decorated-link\" rel=\"nofollow\">Jack Frost<\/a><\/i> and M. Night Shyamalan\u2019s <i><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/gp\/product\/6305784817\/petertchatta\" target=\"_blank\" class=\" decorated-link\" rel=\"nofollow\">Wide Awake<\/a><\/i> were all designed to pull just a little too hard on the audience\u2019s heartstrings, and I found them all off-putting to one degree or another.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>In the near-decade since then, Cross has worked almost exclusively in TV.  But two years ago he began to appear on the big screen again, with bit parts in films like <i><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/gp\/product\/B000HC2OBO\/petertchatta\" target=\"_blank\" class=\" decorated-link\" rel=\"nofollow\">Strangers with Candy<\/a><\/i> (2005) and <i><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/gp\/product\/B000P1XITE\/petertchatta\" target=\"_blank\" class=\" decorated-link\" rel=\"nofollow\">Flags of Our Fathers<\/a><\/i> (2006), and a starring role in <i><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/gp\/product\/B000M5B98A\/petertchatta\" target=\"_blank\" class=\" decorated-link\" rel=\"nofollow\">Running with Scissors<\/a><\/i> (2006), where I thought he did pretty well.  Not that I remember his performance vividly or anything; I just remember thinking he had grown into a decent actor.<\/p>\n<p>And now he\u2019s got a few more films on his roster.  In <a href=\"http:\/\/www.canadianchristianity.com\/cgi-bin\/bc.cgi?bc\/bccn\/0498\/films\" target=\"_blank\" class=\" decorated-link\" rel=\"nofollow\">my review<\/a> of <i>Wide Awake<\/i>, which starred Cross as a kid who goes looking for God in all of the world\u2019s religions, I suggested his name was \u201causpicious\u201d for such a spiritually-themed movie, but that assessment may be doubly true for his next project.  Reports <i><a href=\"http:\/\/www.variety.com\/article\/VR1117976230.html\" target=\"_blank\" class=\" decorated-link\" rel=\"nofollow\">Variety<\/a><\/i>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Joseph Cross, Heather Graham, Barbara Hershey and Tim Curry will star in the indie satire \u201cSon of Mourning.\u201d <a href=\"http:\/\/www.imdb.com\/name\/nm1371819\/\" target=\"_blank\" class=\" decorated-link\" rel=\"nofollow\">Yaniv Raz<\/a> will direct from a screenplay he wrote.<\/p>\n<p>Story, set amid an international climate crisis, centers on a dissatisfied ad copywriter (Cross) who returns home to a resort town in Florida to mediate his parents\u2019 divorce. While there, he is mistaken for the Messiah and must decide whether to use his newfound celebrity to indulge his own selfish desires or to do some good in the world.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>I can\u2019t begin to imagine how such a character would be mistaken for the Messiah \u2014 and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.biblegateway.com\/passage\/?search=Luke%204:23-30;&amp;version=31;\" target=\"_blank\" class=\" decorated-link\" rel=\"nofollow\">in his hometown<\/a>, no less \u2014 but I\u2019m curious to see what this film does with the concept.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Back in 1998, a child actor by the name of Joseph Cross appeared in three films that, to put it mildly, did nothing to make me a fan of his. He might very well have been a good kid to hang out with, but his performances in Desperate Measures, Jack Frost and M. Night Shyamalan\u2019s [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1116,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1222","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>He&#039;s not the Messiah, he&#039;s a former child actor.<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Back in 1998, a child actor by the name of Joseph Cross appeared in three films that, to put it mildly, did nothing to make me a fan of his. 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