In Writer/Director John Michael McDonagh’s follow-up to his impressive directorial debut, the dark comedy, the Guard, he teams up again with actor Brendan Gleeson for a much darker ‘comedy,’ also set in rural Ireland.
Gleeson plays a good, but disillusioned priest who enters the confession booth one day only to be told that the confessor plans to kill him. The confessor was molested as a child and he wants the Catholic Church to pay. Gleeson, now 59, gives another tour de force performance, but due to a contrived script and the self-reverential tone of the film, his plight lacks the dramatic and spiritual dimension it needs to support the climax and weighty theme.
Just as Gleeson’s policeman in The Guard went about his duties in an unorthodox manner, so does Father Lavelle, who likes a drink and swears like a sailor. The script is full of irony, which is most apparent in the high concept. McDonagh set about to reverse the trend in films about abuses in the Catholic Church. Typically the guilty priest gets away with his sins or is let off leniently. Here, the priest who is to receive the ultimate punishment is entirely innocent.
What passes for humour comes partly from Lavelle’s personality and wit and partly from the unsavoury characters in his flock who become suspects as Lavelle tries to identity the man who threatened him. Unlike the Guard, however, there are few real laughs in Calvary.
More than out of his respect for the secrecy of the confessional, Lavelle downplays the threat either because he can’t really believe anyone would kill him or because at this point, he doesn’t care. Lavelle has long been disgusted by those around him and is suffering a conflict of faith himself. In any event, he doesn’t flee. This clears the way for his Calvary to become quite a literal one as the condemned holy man struggles through the tortuous path (which includes watching his church burn down) to his final place of reckoning. He also grows weaker by the day, through drink, lack of sleep, and anguish.
Shot in County Sligo and around Dublin, the film looks great. The lush green landscape –the loud sea and long stretches of dunes and beach – becomes bleak and frightening for its exposure rather than comforting for its beauty and timelessness.
This is all very poetic and adds to the tense atmosphere, but the film is out to impress, rather than involve the audience. McDonagh has clearly studied the art of scriptwriting as his opening is designed not just to catch your attention but to shock you out of your comfort zone. In a fast-paced monologue full of explicit images and unholy language, the confessor tells the priest about his ordeal at the hands of corrupt priests. It’s a tough act to follow, and, while never predictable, the film struggles to sustain its 101 minute running time as everything thereafter seems anti-climactic.
Joyce Glasser
