IT’S A MIRACLE — HE’S STILL ALIVE: After the first responders could not find a pulse, they declared Pastor Piper (Hayden Christensen) as dead and left the scene after calling for a crew to deal with the disposal of the body and the wreckage. An hour or so later, a passing minister stopped to pray for the dead occupant, and to his surprise found that the Pastor was alive. Firemen were immediately summoned and, using the jaws of life, he was extracted from the wreckage and rushed to a hospital where he subsequently recovered.

Traveling Pastor Don Piper was thinking about having his own congregation on his way home from a Christian convention when fate intervened. His car was crushed so badly by a tractor trailer that he was declared dead on the spot by first responders who couldn’t find a pulse.

Since there was no hurry to extract him from the twisted wreckage, he was still lying there over an hour later when a minister (Michael Harding), who was passing by the accident scene, decided to stop and pray for the repose of his soul. But upon approaching the auto, instead of a corpse, he found the supposedly deceased pastor to be very much alive.

In fact, despite his considerable loss of blood, Pastor Piper was faintly singing a Gospel spiritual. A rescue team with the jaws of life was immediately summoned and he was soon extracted and rushed to the hospital.

Although he fought to survive for the sake of his wife (Kate Bosworth) and their three children (Hudson Meek, Bobby Batson, and  Elizabeth Hunter), Don was actually undecided about whether he wanted to live or die. It seems that during his near-death experience on the side of the road, he’d briefly entered heaven.

There, he not only experienced an unparalleled feeling of unending bliss, but also had reunions with a number of dead loved ones, including his great-grandmother (Sallye McDougald Hooks) and two childhood friends (Matthew Bauman and Trevor Allen Martin). By comparison, being back on Earth was relatively painful, given the 34 operations he needed to undergo over the next several months to fix torn muscles, disfigurement, broken bones, and shattered disks.

Thanks to the power of prayer, Pastor Piper ultimately recovered. But rather than open his own church, he wrote a memoir that became a bestseller that describes his entrance into Heaven as well as his subsequent resurrection. Directed by Michael Polish (The Astronaut Farmer) 90 Minutes in Heaven is a modern parable even though the title gives away the ending.

Very Good (***). Rated PG-13 for an intense car accident and graphic images. Running time: 121 minutes. Studio: Giving Films. Distributor: Samuel Goldwyn Films.