Calvary

oldmangrumpus very graciously invited me to join him to catch a free screening of Calvary starring Brendan Gleeson, a film made in Ireland. Gleeson gives the performance of a lifetime in an extremely challenging and beautifully made film, about a priest whose life is threatened in the very first scene. The rest of the film is about his journey through the week from threat to confrontation. Generally speaking, the movie has gotten excellent reviews--and deserves them all--but I found it so upsetting it actually made me cry. I wept all the way home from the theater. If the sign of successful art is that it evokes emotion and provokes thought, this movie certainly does that. But the price is pretty high, for me at least.

oldmangrumpus said that it was a very Irish film, and a very Catholic one. I can't argue either of those points; he's correct. The movie is called "Calvary" for a reason. I felt like there was a lot of spiritual--and in some ways literal--torture here. It's a hard, hard movie--despite some funny moments--and I find myself wondering in the end what the point of it all is. If the film has a failing, that's it. What are we moving towards? What resonance has been found? What truth has been revealed? The answer to that last question is pretty depressing and pretty bleak.

One of the things I said after I left the theater was that I don't want to see movies like this anymore. I'm not sorry to have seen Gleeson's masterwork--and it really is that. But the kind of darkness that this film packs isn't darkness that I want a part of anymore. As a serious movie-goer I may not be able to avoid it, but my theater-going may shift a bit after this.