Right to Life reviews ‘Unplanned’

0

At the Gloria Cinema, 7 and 8 May, “Unplanned,” the true story of Abby Johnson’s conversion from passionate abortion-provider to pro-lifer, was shown to over 170 people. The sponsors were State Representative Nino Vitale and Johnson Welded Products. Abby gets pregnant by her first husband, worthless and unfaithful, and decides to obtain mifepristone at the Planned Parenthood clinic in Bryan, Texas. At home, she suffers severe abdominal cramping, bleeds, and passes out on the bathroom floor, where she lies all night. Nonetheless, she volunteers to work at the Planned Parenthood clinic, and soon moves on to a paid position. The clinic director recognizes her as staunchly pro-abortion after she remains untroubled when separating and accounting for all of a fetus’s body parts in the POC (parts of conception) room. An amused assistant dubs POC “pieces of children.” Abby soon learns to pressure young women into having abortions by lying to them — the longer they wait, the more the abortion will cost. Outside the clinic, devoted pro-lifers, the most prominent being Shawn Carney, pray and counsel the pregnant young women to carry the child, and promise help and support. Anger flares when the pro-lifers succeed because they are interrupting “productivity,” goals for the numbers of abortions being set by “Corporate.” When Corporate doubles the number of abortions required for more profits, Abby starts to doubt that Planned Parenthood has any concern for women. Then she watches an abortion on ultrasound at the behest of the abortion doctor (Anthony Levatino, who performed hundreds of abortions in real life until his conversion). What Abby sees is the unborn baby recoiling from the metal clamps that will tear it apart. She leaves and breaks down in tears and distress in a bathroom. She soon joins the pro-lifers outside the fence and finds herself later being sued in court for being a traitor likely to publicize the brutality she has witnessed. Her attorney wins the case and soon the Planned Parenthood clinic is gone — Shawn Carney and his associates turn it into a pro-life office.

The acting is superb, the hardened and cynical faces of the Planned Parenthood staff contrasting with the kind, earnest faces of the protestors. Abby’s second husband, Doug, is pro-life, and she bears a beautiful daughter. However, for the eight years his wife works at Planned Parenthood, he is unable to get her to quit or convince her that from conception onward the fetus is a human being. That is because the PP staff live by hard lines: “it’s not a baby,” “women have reproductive rights,” “it will be a very short procedure and you can go right on with your life.” However, one young girl gets her uterus perforated and the blood flows nearly nonstop. The clinic director instructs her staff not to call an ambulance since the pro-lifers will take pictures and follow up with the case.

Abby comes to see the PP facility as a prison, and indeed it is a fortress equipped with video surveillance and surrounded by tall metal fences and locked gates. The sprinklers have been pointed outward to shoot at the pro-lifers. When an escort comes out to take a woman inside, she is told to keep talking about the weather or anything to drown out the prayers and pleas of the protestors. Inside, no expense has been spared to make it look like an ultramodern hospital, and the word “abortion” is never mentioned.

The staff live well, as the clinic director explains to Abby what she could lose: high salaries, upscale homes, expensive cars, and romantic vacations. The money flows in and there is mention of wealthy donors: Warren Buffett, George Soros, the Bill Gates Foundation. Those who have read Alex Kershaw’s The Liberator (2012) will recognize the set-up, similar to Dachau; inhuman cruelties inside the camp and immaculate quarters for the staff and guards, with manicured lawns and roses in full bloom.

The movie could not be advertised on the Gloria’s marquee because Hollywood had rated the movie “R.” But the “R” rating is for films that have gratuitous violence and shocking cruelty written into the script. The “Unplanned” directors did not write the clinic’s violence into the script; Abby recorded it in her book from actuality. Similarly, the Dachau story and photos could not be published for a long time after WW2 because the authorities thought the material too horrific for the public to see. Yet the material in “Unplanned” is life-changing, and Abby at last finds herself forgiven by God despite the 22,000 lives she helped to destroy. Anyone who has not seen the movie can get a copy by purchasing one on line.

By David George

Champaign County Right to Life

Champaign County Right to Life is located at 122 Miami St., Urbana. For info, call 937-653-6745 or email [email protected]

No posts to display