Little Hope Was Arson

The film's exploration of the tenuous bonds within a community will surely prompt serious soul-searching.

The filmmaker, Theo Love, presents the people in the story as they are, without passing judgment and without apology, whether they are investigators or pastors or just ordinary folks caught up in the inexplicable. It’s Americana unvarnished and, because of that, as absorbing as it is respectful.

A fascinating story told with deep insight, Little Hope Was Arson finds that both fire and forgiveness burn in different ways.

Theo Love's mesmerizing documentary Little Hope Was Arson is as evenhanded as it is unsettling.

While the crimes were appalling, one leaves Little Hope Was Arson less concerned with them — especially as all the churches have since been rebuilt — than with larger questions of forgiveness.

The film is attractively and professionally packaged however, with accomplished camerawork and editing supporting a narrative that eventually seems to reveal more smoke than fire.