The Crime of Father Amaro
Screening: 7 March 2005
Mexico 2002
Directed by Carlos Carrera
Leading players ~ Gael García Bernal, Ana Claudia Talancón, Sancho Gracia.
118 minutes (subtitles).
Synopsis
Father Amaro, played by Mexican looker Gael Bernal (Amores Perros, Y Tu Mama Tambien), is a young priest in a Mexican village. Having been selected by his bishop for the job he soon finds that the rural hinterland is overgrown with corruption that reaches across all aspects of church and secular life. His various colleagues are in bed with guerrillas, drug magnates and housekeepers and it’s not long before Amaro finds that temptations, especially with Amelia, his young adoring catechism student, are difficult to ignore.* * * * * *
The film follows his inevitable ambivalence through this well trodden moral maze and delivers a denouement that underlines the oppressive and atmospheric pathos of the film’s rural and religious settings.
