BEFORE: Went back to work today, but fortunately it's only a two-day work week. Sweet.
THE PLOT: In a Bronx Catholic school in 1964 a popular priest's ambiguous relationship with a troubled 12 year old black student is questioned by the school's principal.
AFTER: Hmmm. I'm not seeing what all the fuss was about, as far as this movie's plot is concerned. I mean, it seems pretty one-note. I suppose it's a microcosm for the entirety of the priesthood, and all of their foibles where young boys are concerned, but because it's set in 1964, everyone speaks with these veiled references about an "improper relationship", and it seems like everyone's afraid to come out and say what's on their minds.
And essentially it's a game of "He said/she said" between the priest in question, and the school's principal - but because we never saw what happened, there will always be...well, you can see the title.
I did my time as an altar boy in the late 70's, and I emerged (relatively) unscathed. Is it wrong of me to wonder how I got so lucky? Was there something wrong with me, was I not cute enough?
When the big scandals broke in the late 90's, I sort of sat back and waited for Catholicism as a whole to crumble, and I'm still waiting. I'm always quick to point out that celibacy was not originally part of the church, and in fact has no real connection to a person's holiness or divinity. The entire reason that priests are required to be celibate has everything to do with the Catholic Church's ownership of land in the Middle Ages - because if there were no offspring of priests, there could be no claims of inheritance on their land. That's it - there's nothing in the Bible that says priests should be celibate, and in fact if you count Jesus's disciples as the first priests, he even instructed them to "Be fruitful and multiply", so there would be more believers.
So I feel that the whole system is a put-on, and over time this connection has been made between celibacy and divinity, and that connection is nothing more than an imaginary human construct. Asking someone to deny their human natures seems quite unnatural, and somehow (through a process no one really understands very well) this leads to priests who lust after young boys. It's a complex issue, and I'm sure it's not a strict cause/effect relationship, but I've still got my suspicions.
Starring Philip Seymour Hoffman (last seen in "Charlie Wilson's War"), Meryl Streep (last seen in "Lions for Lambs"), Amy Adams (also last seen in "Charlie Wilson's War"), and Viola Davis (last seen in "Kate & Leopold")
RATING: 6 out of 10 free throws
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