About 10 years ago, a video was released called “The Secret”. This video became so popular it even made it to the Oprah Winfrey Show. The message in this video was very simple, “if you think about something that you want so badly often enough and strongly enough, then the universe will give it to you”. It would be great if something like this were true, and the popularity of this message was mostly caused by so many millions of people wanting it to be true, rather than it being actually true. The fervor of the video and this message eventually died down, only a few short years later. Since then, I have not seen any sign of the The Secret, not until the new movie “The Secret: Dare to Dream”, starring Josh Lucas and Katie Holmes was released through On Demand some days ago.

I agree with most of the critics who have said that this story is too much like a small Nicolas Sparks book. While the story is rather simple and “Nicolas Sparks” like, I thought that overall, the story and message was good enough to give this film marginal recommendation.

The main character Miranda Wells is played by Katie Holmes. She is raising 3 kids as a single mother, ever since her husband died 5 years earlier. Her life is all about having no money and being in huge debt, with both a car and house that is falling apart. Then enters Bray, played by Josh Lucas who is a professor of Mechanical Engineering from Vanderbilt University. Through a series of coincidences that all start with a minor car accident, Bray starts to help Miranda and her 3 children with some of their money problems – the worst problem is fixing up their house after a Hurricane. I thought that the story did take too long to wind down, as Bray is carrying a huge secret from Miranda, all the way down to the last minutes of this movie. Other than that, the story was well told and the acting was well done.

The 28% ratings on Rotten Tomatoes are absurd – with the audience ratings of 76% far more accurate. My rating is 70% and I do give this movie a marginal recommendation.