FOR THE BIBLE TELLS ME SO

Not rated Where: Lagoon Cinema.

For some viewers, this documentary about the often-contentious relationship between organized religion and homosexuality is going to be about politics. And there is plenty of that. But if you can look beyond the polemics, this is also a powerful story about the emotional pain and psychological trauma that splits families and breaks hearts.

First-time filmmaker Dan Karslake (a producer of the PBS series "In the Life") focuses on five families, including that of Gene Robinson, whose election as an Episcopal bishop in 2003 has become a worldwide controversy that threatens to divide the church. Watching the soft-spoken man talk about his religious upbringing, he comes off as one of the least controversial people you could ever meet.

Of particular interest to Minnesotans is the Reitan family, formerly of Mankato and now living in the Twin Cities. When Jake Reitan announced that he was gay, his mother and father, Phil and Randi, were devastated. They had been taught by the church that homosexuality is "an abomination."It felt like someone had punched me in the stomach, and the pain didn't go away for a month," Phil Reitan says. Eventually, however, the family not only reconciled their religion with their son's homosexuality, they became active in the gay-rights movement.

Not all stories end as happily, however. Mary Lou Wallner blames herself for her daughter Anna's suicide, which came after Wallner rejected Anna when she announced she was lesbian. And husband-and-wife preachers Brenda and David Poteat still are struggling to come to grips with their lesbian daughter. David makes no secret of the fact that it's going to be a long time -- if ever -- before he can fully embrace his daughter again. Any parent, regardless of his or her politics, has to feel that pain.

Jeff Strickler

BILL'S BIG PUMPKINS

Unrated; suitable for all audiences. Where: Oak Street Cinema.

Growing "Jack and the Beanstalk"-sized pumpkins has been the longtime obsession of Wright County farmer Bill Foss. Does that mean he's out of his gourd? This affectionate, handsomely produced feature documentary by his son Ryan suggests he's only slightly eccentric in his quest for gigantic fruit. For years, he's entered his inedible, 1,000-pound-plus monstrosities in competitions at the Minnesota State Fair. Most years, as Bill puts it, he "squashes the competition."

Like "Spellbound" or "Wordplay," which made spelling bees and crossword competitions tense and exciting, the movie creates a delightful aura of tension around Bill's pursuit of a new state trophy. Aided by a bouncy guitar score by Steve Kaul and plenty of technical verve (time-lapse photos of the seedlings' growth might sound prosaic, but it's actually astounding), "Bill's Big Pumpkins" is no garden-variety documentary. The Fosses will attend the screenings at 7 p.m. Friday and 2:30 and 7 p.m. Saturday for a Q&A and show-and-tell with a giant jack-o-lantern on a flatbed truck. Only in Minnesota.

Colin Covert

THE DEVIL CAME ON HORSEBACK

Unrated; documentary war violence. Where: Bell Museum.

Brian Steidle, a former U.S. Marine, expected he'd retire early and spend his later years sailing. Those plans changed when he became a military adviser to the African Union monitoring team in Sudan. Hired as an observer to document the warfare between the country's Arab-dominated government in Khartoum and black African rebels in the province of Darfur, he witnessed a genocide of Gestapo-like brutality.

Trained to protect, he felt powerless as his reports and pictures vanished into the AU's classified files. He recalls thinking, as he helicoptered over a burning village and snapped a telephoto picture of the killers' departing truck, "If I was looking through a scope instead of a camera lens, I could stop this." If only it were that easy.

The gripping documentary "The Devil Came on Horseback" traces the change of heart that compelled Steidle to break military discipline in 2005 and offer his secret photographic evidence of Sudan's vicious ethnic cleansing to the New York Times. Those shattering pictures, shown in rapid montage, are a large part of the film's power. Anyone who can shrug after seeing Steidle's images of charred cadavers and murdered infants is less than a fully functioning human being.

The film has a second wellspring of significance in tracing the aftermath of Steidle's career-ending decision to follow his conscience. Reluctantly, the soldier became a prominent figure in the campaign to end the slaughter in Darfur, speaking out in TV interviews and rallies. The film movingly captures his discomfort with making public pronouncements at war with his conviction that someone must.

Produced and directed by Edina native Annie Sundberg and Ricki Stern (creators of the HBO civil rights documentary "The Trials of Darryl Hunt"), "The Devil Came on Horseback" is an eloquent call to action.

Colin Covert