An atheist develops cancer and has six months to live and pretends to be a Christian to pacify his parents, but inherently converts himself in the process.

Okay, interesting. There’s a huge, and largely untapped, market for heart-warming faith-based movies in the US, so this could actually be a strong commercial proposition.

What’s the genre: comedy, drama? What are the stakes? Presumably he’s going to die whatever, so death isn’t the stakes; his immortal soul, perhaps, but that’s a bit esoteric for a mainstream movie, and will turn off non-religious audience members. Can you find a real life goal or stakes that will play out in those six months?

He wants to reconnect with the strict religious parents who disinherited him, in the hope they’ll pay for experimental cancer treatment? He wants to win over a girl he’s always liked, maybe get her to sleep with him despite her religious beliefs? Then it all blows up in his face when he starts to believe his own act.

If his real conversion is the end of Act Two – what’s Act Three? Maybe everyone has found out he’s been lying, exactly at the point the lie became real, and he has to find a way to convince them it really is real now…?

(And I’m assuming “inherently” is a typo for “inadvertently” or similar. Damn you, autocorrect!)

Hey, I didn’t say they were good – but they get made, and people go see them. And just because they’re bad doesn’t mean nothing good can be made in that genre…