The Crime of Padre Amaro (2002)

Strictly average movie

Absolutely Fantastic

Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

Gael Garcia Bernal was Che Guevara in The Motorcycle Diaries and is just as good as Father Amaro, a Catholic priest filled with doubt about his life's meaning. The good father is sent by a bishop to a small parish where a Father Benito is having a well known affair with a woman with a restaurant in their village. Benito is building a hospital for the poor with money from a drug dealer. Another priest, Padre Natalio is under investigation for his support of left wing revolutionaries. Father Benito's mistress's daughter, Amelia, teaches religion to children. She is only 16 years old and engaged to be married to Ruben who is an atheist while she is a firm believer. Amelia goes to confession to Father Amaro and asks him about love and sin and the man of the cloth soon has impure thoughts about the beautiful teenage girl. Her fiancé Ruben is a journalist and he writes about the corruption, including money laundering involving Father Benito and he is fired by the newspaper due to pressure from the powerful church influence. Amelia breaks off the engagement and begins a sexual relationship with Father Amaro. The moral dilemma is not resolved with a polyannish, everyone living happily ever after nonsense, but with an extremely realistic and heart breaking ending which will remain with you for a long time. The Crime of Father Amaro is a brave and challenging film.

While at times Carlos Carrera's film adaptation of The Crimes of Padre Amaro seemed to progress slowly, the significance of the film was not lost. The silent dialogue powered the film ---the unspoken sentences allude to the hidden hypocrisy, greed, and corruption within the church. So much of the film's language was captured through lightening, camera movement, and glances shared amongst the actors of the film.Viewing this film the audience glimpses into Amaro's mind. The camera travels to give insight into the thoughts of the Padre Amaro. Natural light or very little lighting is frequently utilized in the film to mask the characters half-hidden in shadows and to emphasize specific focal points such as eyes and close views of facial expression. Often the camera lingers emphasizing the silent or somber moments of the film, the moments when these individuals are lost to contemplate their predicaments.In many instances this film draws us away from the religion that permeates the film only to call us back and remind us that these are people obligated to their faith---an oath. This is done with music as well as the focus of the camera. Very little music is used in the film. In scenes of intense passion---such as the first truly intimate moments of Amelia and Amaro music is deliberately removed from the scene. This is a scene that is neither glamorized nor criticized. Aside from music heard coming from car radios etc. the only other music used throughout the film was classical often played in times of conflict between the actions and the religion of the characters. Like music, the camera plays upon these times of internal/external conflict. When Amaro and Amelia share their first kiss in the pews of the church the camera pans away from these two people and instead zooms in upon the figure of a porcelain Virgin Mary.The film successfully draws attention to the very reality of conflict that exist between religion, politics, and the internal struggles of the individuals within these systems.

For many priests, celibacy is a true vocation which liberates them... For others, it is a lifelong struggle... If celibacy was made voluntary, not only would many priests be happier, but the Church would be richer... Above all, it might decide the only way to restore the numbers of the priesthood, and that seems to me not a bad idea...In "The Crime of Father Amaro," the top film in Mexican box-office history, Carlos Carrera shows that even a man with morals and scruples betrays the nature of his profession, mostly when he brazenly criticizes the priesthood, and questions the Catholic Church's representatives on a variety of charges like illicit love affair, corruption, drug dealing, and hypocrisy...The story takes a liberal priest, Father Amaro(Gael Garcia Bernal), protégé of a repulsive obese bishop (Ernesto Gomez Cruz), to the remote dusty village of Los Reyes to assist the older priest of the parish Father Benito (Sancho Gracia) in his daily work...Amaro quickly realizes that virtually every fellow priest is involved in something immoral, and that his aging superior is receiving financial help from the region's drug lord for the construction of a new church-run hospital, and is secretly spending his cold nights with the proprietress of a local restaurant Augustina (Anjelica Aragón). He also discovers that Father Natalio (Damian Alcazar) is suspected of aiding the revolutionary factions in opposing the drug lords and mobsters...Amaro's own weaknesses is put to the test when he finds himself led into temptation by Augustina 's extremely sensual teenager Amelia (Ana Claudia Talancón) a relationship that eventually goes way outside the bounds of his priestly oath... and, without any sign of inner turmoil, he embarks on a passionate affair with the devout catechism teacher...Amalia—for whom loving a young priest serves as an extension of her deep piety—decides that the good-looking priest is the one for her and rejects her disappointed boyfriend, the aggressive reporter Ruben (Andres Montiel) who wrote an article alleging that the hospital is a front for laundering drug money...The polemical film focuses on blasphemous scenes as on a vicious priest who stops at nothing, even by continuing the lies and hypocrisy to protect his career...

Hey! Its 2006 and I just saw this movie for the first time and think it is great! What a film! The scary part is that this novel was originally written in 1875, and yet the topics and issues are very contemporary.After watching the film it was no wonder the book has been hidden for so long!!! I felt as if I traveled back in time, to my own adolescence...Raw, passionate, and innocent. While watching this film you will feel that you have experienced love that you shouldn't have!You will be reminded of that youthful passion that was stronger than you wanted it to be. You will be gently reminded of how you were once over powered by a sense of first love/lust.Come on... you remember that crazy willingness to do anything just so you can touch?...to give in to the passionate urge...one so powerful that it might just make more sense to bend our beliefs and our integrity...for just one moment of passion? Oh, the truth and the lies we once told ourselves...just for s...? It must be love, right? Ha! This film also has parallels between older and younger characters to remind us that these feelings do not always leave us even though we grow old. Struggles remain...why? and...So,whose secrets do you know? do you have your own? just how far will you let your passion take you? hmmm...The Crime of Father Amaro is a tantalizing film...pits faith against human nature. This film also has educational value in the secondary characters...it shows how natives of Latin America try to blend pagan idolatry or witchcraft with the modern church. It also shows how the mentally and physically handicap in Latin America barely survive. It shows how the Latin community must depend on the support of family and the church for their sustenance and education. Another film for ardent movie goers. Spanish with English subtitles.