Ordinary Sinner (2001)

Powerful

How sad is this?

As Good As It Gets

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

"Ordinary Sinner" is not a film I would have normally sought out. But I saw it on the Logo network while channel-surfing and gave it a chance. I am VERY glad I did! This is a quiet film. Nothing flashy, though the main character is a very beautiful man. The point of the film, however, is to show how things get out of hand with tragic results when someone gets a crazy idea in his head. This is something that we have all seen... a man gets a dumb idea in his head and it leads him to doing something horrible. Ordinary people can end up doing horrible things. Hence the title "Ordinary sinner." The heart of the movie is a priest who is a very godly man. He shows how religion can be used for good. A member of his congregation gets a crazy idea in his head, which leads him to do evil in the name of religion.You can see that this is the perfect parable for today.Brendan Hines is excellent as the young man who drops out of a seminary, who holds the entire movie together. His stunning good looks make the movie very enjoyable.Peter Onorati is wonderful as a man who fiercely stands up to wrong, who attempts to bring justice in the end. Onorati is fantastic in this strong, passionate role.A. Martinez is perfect as the Mexican priest around whose life the entire movie is centered. Martinez is a powerhouse actor, and he brings great depth to the role and to this movie.

It was a good story, but not very well told. I liked the themes and the main story line, which wasn't as clear as it could have been. Maybe there was too much going on and a lack of ability to reign it all in. The acting was okay to cheesy, some were stronger than others and even the stronger actors had their moments of lesser quality acting. It took me a couple of months to get through the entire movie because it didn't keep my attention and the flow was just bad. I only just finished watching it and I'm glad I did as the movie finally gets moving and has some continuity toward the end. Again, a good story, but the delivery was sub par. Would recommend it for the story line and maybe a little eye candy, and I do mean, a little.

This foolish, implausible tale is redeemed only by the opening scene in which a hard-boiled police detective delivers some nearly-audible lines confirming our greatest fears: He is dead. Perhaps the film would have been saved had the director forgone the dazzling star power of A. Martinez in favor of this sadly-anonymous actor who filled the screen for a brief moment. That a no-name hack-tor off the street could salvage such a dishwater film is no less likely than a villain committing murder by dropping stones into a quarry for an unsuspecting diver. His moment is brief; his promise is immense. Perhaps we will be treated to more screen time by this obscure thespian if there is ever a sequel to this ill-advised film.

Just when you think you've possibly seen the worst film ever made, along comes another one! Thank God, I didn't pay to see this one! I rented it on a dare at Netflix to get my monthly quota and granted, I had to sit all the way through it to see how bad it could get. First of all, it's a Wolfe release, which means it MUST have a gay plot or subplot. In the first scene when our "hero" is introduced, you have no doubt that it's a gay film, as Brian P. Hines comes across as fey as any of the drags in "Adventures of Priscilla". But WAIT! NO! He's our STRAIGHT hero. You keep hoping that he has had an affair with Alex, Scott, or A. Martinez...but that never came to pass. Oh, no, he fell in and out of love several times with Elizabeth Banks, who is sappy enough to make Jerry Falwell turn to boys.Not even well-seasoned actors such as A. Martinez and Peter Onorati can come close to making headway of this flimsy plot. "A" must have taken to role only to buy his way out of the picture less than halfway through. Good for him! But this is a murder mystery. SPOILER!!! The victim is a cliff diver and the murderer takes a rowboat and makes hundreds of trips to pile many, many rocks in the lake for the victim to hit his head. God! How inventive! Enter the ugly redheaded redneck who stands up in the Episcopal church and denounces ALL gays. He HAS to be the murderer! He just HAS to be, according to the screenwriter. Could this be a redheaded herring? Surely not. There's only six or eight male characters, could one of THEM be the murderer instead? But which one? The tension is building you to the edge of your toilet seat in case you're still throwing up! And oh my! The MUSIC! The glorious Yamaha Clavichord, sounding like the Twentieth Century Fox Symphony, playing one of the two themes...one lush, the other suspenseful! But there IS humor! Turn on the commentary track on the DVD and listen to the director and screenwriter praise this piece of schlock and what a great job everyone did. They even cut out four scenes because they slowed the pace of the picture. I know, it's tough to make a turtle sprint.Why didn't they have the guts to make the hero gay, slap the girl down, have him run back to prison to wait on Scott? Or have him fall in love with his best friend, Alex? That's the way the picture was headed and would have been ten times better! This film IS a landmark in this day and age. It should encourage young directors, writers, and producers by showing that a film can be made on a $1,000 budget and have money left over after your line producer has paid the cast and crew. Surely, none of them were paid scale, because it's obvious that outside of Martinez and Onorati, none of them have enough talent to get a SAG card. Just what the hell is the Slamdunk Award which was presented to this film? It's a slamdunk, all right, right into the watery porcelain bowl!