I was intrigued by the title, Brother Born Again, and did not read the description. I was surprised that there were a few twists: he was Jewish, and he wasn’t just born again, he was out in a commune called The Farm in the Alaskan wilderness born again. The filmmaker is a bisexual woman and feels really judged and abandoned by her brother while simultaneously prejudging the brother. It is awkward because when they finally do reunite, he surprisingly seems less preoccupied or interested in discussing anything other than his community or the Bible, including anything about his sister. Her sexuality seems to be a distant after thought for him. She is right-when he thinks about it, he is not approving, but he doesn’t castigate her or try to change her. No Westboro Baptist Church moments here. He still claims her as his sister and loves her. Maybe he was doing her a favor by extricating himself if she felt he was judgey though his move away from his family isn’t a unique one-no member lives near the other so it isn’t estrangement, just distance. What makes it extra awkward: he isn’t stupid so he knows that sure it is a reunion, but he is also the subject of a film and may be more symbolic than a person to his family. He is supposed to have status, a professional job, a family, a cosmopolitan lifestyle when all he wants to be is happy. In the end, Brother Born Again inadvertently made the brother seem less of a weirdo than he seems on paper because he doesn’t allow himself to play a preordained male role that his family expected him to play. Instead he decides to be happy by following God despite an incredible amount of pressure to conform to certain societal roles: the doting grandson living in NYC to be near his grandmother, the successful son with a good job or the omnipresent brother to act as protector and nurturer. Brother Born Again may not portray the kind of Christian that I’m used to, but there was a quiet, simple dignity to his abandoning expectations and just being happy in the present. I would be intrigued to find out if he decided to leave The Farm because it seemed like he would do that at any moment if he thought it was the right thing to do, and I am interested in what he thinks a life in the world while following God would look like.