The Apostate (2000)

Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!

A lot of fun.

It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

This movie has a concept that was ahead of its time. One has to have some level of intelligence and no Catholic hang ups to understand the twisted mind set of the two main characters. A surprising ending as well! Every time I watch it I see more that I had missed originally. The scenery is real and the frightening artist portrayed by Dennis Hopper reminded me of his character portrayal in Blue Velvet. I absolutely loved the chubby priest who, for a time, added a bit of comedy. I just worry that, since it was released over 10 years ago that it might have been toned down a bit due to the suggestion of priestly improprieties. The direction was brilliant.

I really enjoyed this film, and for someone who is neither a Dennis Hopper fan, and the last thing I remember seeing Richard Grieco in was "21 Jump Street" (now I feel old) I really was able to appreciate the depth of the characters, and the overall storyline had my attention from the very start. For an impulse buy movie, it is one I will watch again and again. The ending had me confused at first, but after reviewing the final scenes (I am not going to divulge anything specific) I was able to figure out where it was going. I think the depictions of the Catholic church were really good, and especially loved Father Killans "confession". Its sad they butchered the final cut in post production, but when it comes to films, writers/directors are interested in art and vision, whereas editors and studios are interested in run time and box office gross. In my opinion, not really a fair trade off.

Richard Greico can't act. He's good-looking, but he can't act. Dennis Hopper, however, CAN act and that's why I was so surprised to see him in such a bad movie. The basic premise of this film is that an art expert can use his knowledge of art and what a 'painting' tells him about its artist to help track down a killer, even with no other clues. Believable? No! This one is not worth your time.

This was an impulse pick up for me from the local video store. Don't make the same mistake I did. This movie is tedious, unconvincingly acted, and generally boring. The dialogue between the young priest and his uncle is particularly poorly written and delivered; I cringed at every scene they shared. Dennis Hopper makes a few sparse appearances and is his usual disjointed self; his role was clearly not a stretch for him. And although the movie is supposedly set in Puerto Rico, it feels a lot more like a Hollywood movie lot; all of the main characters are Caucasian and several tend to speak English with pseudo-Irish accents. Odd. Anyway, when you see this one on the shelf of your local video store, keep walking.