Utopia ~  a mythical ideal place or state of perfection

You never know who might change your life …

If you missed the movie, 7 Days in Utopia, or just weren’t interested in another “subpar” golf movie, when first released in 2011, I ran across it again recently and have to say, I liked it then, and I still like it.

From the book Seven Days in Utopia: Golf’s Sacred Journey, by David L. Black, it’s the story of Luke Chisolm (Lucas Black), a man who has a catastrophic meltdown at a mini tour golf tournament, leaving him broken and bitter, at the end of his proverbial rope.

Angry and embarrassed, he drives off from the tournament, down the back roads of Texas, and begins to analyze the destruction he is so desperate to leave behind. It is a defining moment in Luke’s life. His golf game is in turmoil and as a result, his relationship with his caddy/father seems strained beyond repair. Luke’s life is spinning out of control and he doesn’t know how to stop it.

Just when he thinks it couldn’t get any worse, Luke wrecks his car at a fork in the road and finds himself stuck in a small town called Utopia, Texas … far from home.

Here in Utopia, he meets a man who will change his golf game and his life forever … Johnny Crawford (Robert Duvall). Johnny asks Luke to stay for seven days and embark on a journey he will not soon forget. Over the next week, stranded in Utopia, Luke learns more about golf, life, and faith than he ever bargained for.mail

Utopia is a place of mythical proportion, but its teachings are profound and everlasting. Luke discovers his purpose while fly fishing, painting and flying planes. He explores relationship with the likes of Sarah Hawkins (Deborah Ann Woll), Lily (Melissa Leo), Jake (Brian Geraghty) and Mabel (Kathy Baker). Johnny Crawford and the values of Utopia, Texas, affect Luke in a way he never thought possible.

I know, only in Utopia can you enter one day with the weight of the world on your shoulders and leave a week later ready to conquer life. Only in Utopia can you find love and your sense of purpose all over again. Johnny is no ordinary teacher and this is no ordinary town.

The story is predictable and sappy at times. But it’s a Hollywood movie with a moral to it, and that’s a rarity one shouldn’t shoot down just because Russ Breimeier, in a Christianity Today review, called it a “triple bogey” of a movie. Perhaps with a golf handicap like mine, this is why I am attracted to it.

Maybe you’ll join Mr. Breimeier in giving it a solid “thumbs down,” but, I still like it enough to think it’s worth an hour and forty minutes of the “free time” you were planning on spending catching up on TV reruns.