History Film / Saved

[[quoteright:350:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/saved.jpg]]

Mary, a rising senior at American Eagle Christian HighSchool, has a great life. Wonderful friends, a great Christian boyfriend named Dean, and a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. But one day during the summer, [[LastHetRomance Dean confides in her that he might be gay,]] and she has a crisis of faith. She makes a deal with God to [[CureYourGays cure him by having sex with him]], and soon all is well.

Then, on the first day of school, she's informed that Dean has been sent to Mercy House for "rehabilitation", after his parents discovered his gay porn stash. Then come the missed periods, and the morning sickness. As she struggles both with her faith, and to hide her pregnancy from her single mom and judgmental friends, she finds an unlikely ally in Cassandra Edelstein, a shunned Jewish bad girl who's only at the school because no one else will take her.

Mary, a rising senior at American Eagle Christian HighSchool, has a great life. Wonderful friends, a great Christian boyfriend named Dean, and a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. But one day during the summer, [[LastHetRomance Dean confides in her that he might be gay,]] she has a crisis of faith. She makes a deal with God to cure him by having sex with him, and soon all is well.

Then, on the first day of school, she's informed that Dean has been sent to Mercy House for "rehabilitation," after his parents discovered his gay porn stash. Then come the missed periods, and the morning sickness. As she struggles both with her faith, and to hide her pregnancy from her single mom and judgmental friends, she finds an unlikely ally in Cassandra Edelstein, a shunned Jewish bad girl who's only at the school because no one else will take her.

* BitchInSheepsClothing: Hilary Faye can give the LovableAlphaBitch vibe, but she's a straight up AlphaBitch. On good terms with her so as long as her outlooks on religious beliefs aren't opposed. Oppose them in any way and you'll see just what sort of friend she is and that her act of kindness is solely built on being TheFundamentalist and EgocentricallyReligious.

* BreakTheHaughty: Happens to [[spoiler:Hilary Faye]] twice, first when [[spoiler:Roland and Cassandra put up pictures of her when she was fat and ugly,]] and then when [[spoiler:Tia proves she actually vandalized the school after she swore publicly she didn't.]]

* ChekhovsGun: A certain messianiac billboard at the beginning of the movie will play a part during Hilary Faye's BTH. Averted with the actual gun Hilary Faye shoots at the beginning of the movie.
* TheCharmer: Patrick

* CrisisOfFaith: Averted; in spite of now being in a ''VERY'' (traditionally) un-Christian extended family of a gay father, a NayTheist step-father and a Jewish godmother, Mary's faith in the Christian God is as strong as ever after the birth of her child, although she's more tolerant and accepting of other walks of life.

* FallenPrincess: Mary, after word gets out about her pregnancy. [[spoiler: And Hilary Faye, as a result of her double BreakTheHaughty.]]

** Averted with the scene of Hilary Faye at the gun range. In the original ending, Hilary Faye was to shoot up her prom [[spoiler:after getting expelled]]. While this ending was changed, the scene at the gun range stayed in as an artifact of this.

-->'''Hilary Faye:''' Oh, shut ''up'', you fornicator! And I did not hack into the school's computer system and cover our walls with that blasphemous graffiti either!
* HappilyAdopted: Though we don't see Veronica interact with her (Black) parents very much, she is quite hilariously thankful that they saved her from being a heathen in Vietnam.

* HypocriticalHumor: Hilary Faye while throwing a bible at Mary: "I am ''filled'' with Christ's love!"
* InsaneTrollLogic : An in-universe example from Pastor Skip. "God is punishing us by getting our attention through Mary."
* InsistentTerminology : "This is a Vespa!"

* LightIsNotGood: Hilary Faye

** Mary, a genuinely sweet, kind-hearted and decent girl in spite of all the pain suffered.

* NiceGuy: Dean, Mary's boyfriend at the beginning of the movie, and Patrick, Mary's boyfriend at the end of the movie. Roland is more cynical but he is kind to both Cassandra and Mary.

* ProphecyTwist: An ambiguous example. The plot is kicked off when Mary believes she's received a vision of Jesus, who says to her, "Dean needs you now. You must do all you can to help him." Mary believes this means she has to sleep with Dean to cure him of being gay. It doesn't work, but the very fact that it doesn't work indirectly helps Dean come to terms with being gay, and [[spoiler:he has a boyfriend at the end of the movie.]]

* SiblingYinYang: Hilary and Roland Faye. He's a DisabledSnarker and intellectual, who openly criticizes Christianity, his sister and his parents, but [[JerkWithAHeartOfGold genuinely cares]] for Cassandra and Mary [[spoiler:and Hilary, though it takes her epic-class FreakOut to make him show it]]. She, on the other hand, is a HolierThanThou Christian [[TheFundamentalist fundamentalist]][=/=]StrawHypocrite, who frequently plays TeachersPet (kissing up to Pastor Skip, trying to "save" Cassandra and calling for people to pray for Mary and Dean, organizing the prom, etc.)... and still [[spoiler: frames Cassandra and Mary for graffiting the school, thereby inadvertently outing Mary's pregnancy to the whole school, swears a denial to God only to be publicly outed as a big fake, and suffers her VillainousBreakdown]].

* TeenPregnancy

* RaceLift: The statue of {{Jesus}}.

* FemaleGaze: The school puts on, [[{{irony}} ironically]], JesusChristSuperstar. The only scene they show is the crucifixion in which Patrick is playing Jesus. There is a loving shot of his body, the camera starts on his crotch and pans up to his face where he is moaning as if in pain. [[DeadpanSnarker Cassandra]] adds [[DoubleEntendre "Now that's what I call being hung on the cross."]]

* PassionPlay: The school play that year is ''Music/JesusChristSuperstar''. For those familiar with the musical, that's a rather ''[[MisaimedFandom ironic]]'' choice for such a rigid school.

* ChekhovsGun: A certain messianiac billboard at the beginning of the movie will play a part during Hilary Faye's BTH
** Averted with the actual gun Hilary Faye shoots at the beginning of the movie.

** Not ''too'' exaggerated, though; while they may be rare, and by no means is this an accurate portrayal of the average Evangelical Christian, there are communities that are about as religiously devoted as portrayed in the movie.
* CoolCar: Cassandra's vintage muscle car.
** Subverted with the "handi-van." Hilary Faye had prayed for an expensive vehicle, and [[BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor that's what she got]].

* CureYourGays: Mary tries to do this with Dean. It fails, kicking off the plot in the process.
** So do Dean's parents. And Hilary Faye. And Hilary Faye's entire ''prayer circle''. In fact, it's probably the second biggest theme/plot arc of the movie.

* ExpositoryHairstyleChange: At the beginning of the film, Roland's hair is cleanly combed. [[spoiler:After Cassandra ruffles his hair affectionately on their first "date", his hair becomes progressively messier as he gains his independence.]]

* FallenPrincess: [[spoiler:Hilary Faye, as a result of her double BreakTheHaughty.]]
** Mary, after word gets out about her pregnancy.

* {{Foreshadowing}}: Several to Mary's pregnancy: Her asking her mom if she'd send her to Mercy House, Veronica saying Dean and Mary's hypothetical children could have the gay passed on, and several others.

* MeaningfulName: Mary, Mary, Mary, ''Mary''. Also facepalmingly so with ''Rol''and.
** Mary's is also a debatable case of PropheticNames, since, just like her Biblical namesake, Mary [[spoiler:becomes a mother due to (what she thinks is) her service to God]].

* MissionFromGod: Mary thinks she has been directed by Jesus personally to "cure" Dean.
** Hilary Faye thinks the same thing about Cassandra, which the latter exploits.

* NiceGirl: Mary, a genuinely sweet, kind-hearted and decent girl in spite of all the pain suffered.

* PrecisionFStrike: After discovering she's pregnant, Mary [[SmiteMeOhMightySmiter stands in front of a church and says "Shit. Fuck. Goddamn."]] To her, the last is probably the most devastating curse word.
** The "shit" seems to have been dubbed in. As filmed, it looks like Mary is saying "fuck" twice. The first "fuck" was probably changed to "shit" to keep the movie PG-13.

* TotallyRadical: Pastor Skip.
** Amusingly, the students all seem to buy it. Then again, they're not exactly a hip crowd themselves...

* TransparentCloset: Referenced, with regards to Dean. While Mary and the Christian Jewels are shocked and disgusted by the idea that Dean is gay, Roland asserts, "What? It wasn't like it was some big secret. He was like a one-man gay pride parade."

* FemaleGaze: The school puts on, [[{{irony}} ironically]], JesusChristSuperstar. The only scene they show is the crucifixion in which Patrick is playing Jesus. There is a loving shot of his body, the camera starts on his crotch and pans up to his face where he is moaning as if in pain. [[TDeadpanSnarker Cassandra]] adds [[DoubleEntendre "Now that's what I call being hung on the cross."]]

* FemaleGaze: The school puts on, [[{{irony}} ironically]], JesusChristSuperstar. The only scene they show is the crucifixion in which Patrick is playing Jesus. There is a loving shot of his body, the camera starts on his crotch and pans up to his face where he is moaning as if in pain. [[DeadpanSnarker Cassandra]] adds [[DoubleEntendre "Now that's what I call being hung on the cross."]]
* {{Foreshadowing}}: The scene where Mary asks Lillian [[spoiler:how quick she'd be to send her to Mercy House]].

* TheCastShowoff: Although somewhat playing against type, Mandy Moore still has to have a scene where she gets to show off her beautiful singing voice.

* YourJustJealous: Hilary Faye accuses Mary of just being jealous of Hilary Faye's success in the Lord; true to this trope, the accusation holds no water, as Mary is legitimately angry that her supposed "friend" has just tried to ''forcibly perform an exorcism on her''.

* GodGuise: An ambiguous example. When Mary knocks her head on a ladder in the pool at the beginning, Dean slips on the pool deck and is thus unable to help her, which requires a nearby pool worker to jump into the water to save her instead. The pool worker bears a physical resemblance to what Mary believes Jesus looks like, and it is deliberately left up to the viewer to decide whether this means this inspired Mary's "vision" of Jesus or whether Mary's vision of Jesus was real.

** Subverted with Hilary Faye, who interestingly ''seems'' like a nice girl at the beginning of the movie, at least on the surface (she pushes Roland's wheelchair around, she responds to provocations by hoping the provokers will accept Jesus, she tries to mentor Mary, etc.). Her true colors as an antagonist only come out when she is resisted or disagreed with.

* UnderstandingBoyfriend: Patrick and Mary are clearly attracted to each other when they meet, but Mary keeps turning down Patrick's advances because she is afraid of how he will react to her pregnancy, believing that him being attracted to her will be a mistake. [[spoiler:He eventually discovers off-screen that Mary is pregnant, but he turns up with a limo and a corsage and reassures Mary that it's no big deal to him, and this is what finally convinces Mary to accept a date with him to the prom. He is also in the hospital at the end and is on good terms with Dean, despite the fact that the baby is Dean's child instead of his.]]

* AdamWesting: "Up next on {{Lifetime|MovieOfTheWeek}}, Valerie Bertinelli stars in ''Bitter Harvest'', a sensitive portrayal of one woman's struggle with cancer…"

* BitchInSheepsClothing: Hilary Faye.

* FauxAffablyEvil: Hilary Faye as a religious variant.

* AcceptableTargets: Christians, naturally, but mostly Evangelical Conservative ones.

* TheDanza: Pastor Skip's son, Patrick, is played by Patrick Fugit.