Calvary

Making a film that deals with the child abuse scandals surrounding the Catholic church is a great challenge due to the delicate nature of the subject matter. John Michael McDonagh’s film Calvary does just that, by taking an individual’s case and exploring the effect of these events on a small town, shaping the impressions of the town folk and impacting on the honest and compassionate priest.

Calvary begins with Father James Lavelle (Brendan Gleeson) receiving a death threat whilst taking confession. As an innocent, caring priest, he is being punished for the involvement of other priests in child abuse and the church’s failure to respond to these allegations, given until “sunday-week” to tie-up his affairs. The victim hopes that by killing the innocent Lavelle, he will draw attention to the atrocities that have brought him great suffering.

The film follows Lavelle over the week building up to the Sunday, which he mostly spends tending to the parishioners and his troubled daughter (Kelly Reilly), all the while dealing with the insensitive citizens and the threat looming over head. The anticipation he feels is conveyed through many short scenes that are cut early, so that we are left slightly bewildered, and troubled, just as Lavelle is troubled by the towns actions towards him. This proved quite effective throughout but I found that a few of them could have done with a bit more time to flesh out the story and provide the audience with a chance for a better emotional response.

The acting is generally fantastic all round. Brendan Gleeson brings such believability to his character, true to his performances in many of his previous roles, especially as Ken in In Bruges - directed by McDonagh’s brother, Martin McDonagh. Chris O'Dowd too, holds a powerful presence on the screen, drawing on his previous comedic roles to dish out the black humour whilst proving that he can act just as brilliantly in dramatic roles. Other notable performances come from Dylan Moran and Kelly Reilly, but Aidan Gillen wasn't quite as believable I found.

Whilst many of the exterior shots present a bleak look, with muted colours, the interiors are generally warmer which I found was a nice balance. Overall, the camera wasn't too active but I found that this works perfectly for this very dialogue-driven script. The film score is sometimes dormant but slowly creeps in at the right times, with religious choral pieces perfectly setting the tone, especially towards the end.

Overall, I found Calvary to be a very powerful film that deals with the contemporary issues that surround the Catholic church delicately, but without subduing their significance and severity and hence struck a perfect balance in confronting these themes.