Calvary is a 2014 black comedy-drama film written and directed by John Michael McDonagh. It stars Brendan Gleeson as Father James Lavelle, a good priest in a small Irish town who is told he will be murdered by a parishioner. The film follows Father Lavelle over the course of a week as he faces increasing hostility from locals and struggles to maintain his faith and goodness. The film features excellent writing and performances from its all-Irish cast. Though it deals with heavy themes of religion and faith in modern society, it does so in a balanced way without taking sides. Overall, Calvary is praised for its quality acting, script, and exploration of relevant themes.

1. Calvary – Review
The general scopeof Irish cinema, while never being dreadful, very
rarely stunned audiences outside of the country’s tiny borders. Yes there are
films such as Michael Collins and My LeftFoot, but apart fromNeil Jordan, the
general public aren’t able to connect with the works of any Irish director
consistently. However, thattrend in recent years might be changing: enter
John Michael McDonagh, who hit the scene as the writer-director of the largely
successfulcomedy The Guard, starring veteran Irish actor Brendan Gleeson.
Critically lauded and quickly becoming a cult hit, McDonagh had struck gold,
and his follow-up film was now something that was waited on with baited
breath. Now in 2014, that film is here: again set in small-town Ireland, again
being a black comedy, and again starring Brendan Gleeson, it is the film of the
moment for this here country; Calvary.
Gleeson plays Father James Lavelle, a good priest who means well, living
in a small town in Co. Sligo, who in the opening scene of the film, is told by a
mysterious parishioner thathe (the parishioner) will kill Lavelle next Sunday,
because ‘he is innocent’. The rest of the film shows a week in the life of Lavelle,
as he visits people, offers advice and helps out in any way he can. Out of this
he gets the samereaction: snide, mocking remarks and subtle under-handed
mutterings of hatred towards the church. These people include Frank Hart
(Aiden Gillen), an atheist doctor, Brendan Lynch (Pat Shortt), a foul-tongued
barkeep, Jack Brennan (Chris O’Dowd) a weak-minded butcher, his exotic wife
(Orla O’Rourke), who apparently sleeps with anyoneshe sees, amongstothers.
Lavelle’s daughter Fiona (Kelly Reilly) visits him after shenearly committed
suicide, acting as a moral guidance for him while he does the same for her. As
the week progresses and the people of the community grow more steadily
spiteful, Lavelle finds it harder and harder to remain in the position of the good
pastor, and his old dark habits, as well as the church’s, comeback to haunt
him.
The first thing you will probably notice is that Calvary does not sound
like a comedy of any sorts (it being black not mattering). To an extent, this is
true; large portions of the film consistof this drama-heavy material combined
with relevant interpretations and themes. However, trustme on this, there are
many moments of comedy, mainly basing fromcharacter chemistry and
certain references to the Irish, as well as some flat-out good jokes. Oneof this

2. films’ many strengths is that the humour doesn’tfeel tacked on, there is
something very genuine about its delivery and does feel like casualbanter.
But like I said, that is only one of Calvary’s strengths, so let’s moveon to
the mostnotable: the writing in general. Like McDonagh’s lastwork, it is
incredibly tight, focused, to the point and occasionally subtle – and quite often
hilarious. Combined with the various interesting and relatable characters
created and how they work off each other in order to create situations and set-
ups for future scenes and developments, it is absolutely joyous to see. It has
been quite a while sinceI’vecome across writing this good, and it makes this
film; from the dialogue to the structureof the story, thescript is near-
perfection. And fromthat, nearly every other aspect of the film follows with
the samelevel of quality.
As you haveprobably noticed, the castis almost an ensemble, and
nearly entirely of Irish actors, and they are all excellent. The obvious draw is
Gleeson, who captures both the sharp and determined manner of Lavelle’s
personality but also shows thestrugglehe goes through as well as an inner
pain that occasionally shows its shadowy face. Butas good as his performance
is, the rest of the cast makesure they don’tbecome forgotten, and they all
stand alongside the leading man – or at least, the equivalent to alongsidehim.
FromO’Dowd’s slightly darker takeon the weak middle-aged… well, Chris
O’Dowd, to Shortt’s hatred-driven (and rather pathetic) bartender-type, from
Reilly’s supportive(and equally pained) support, to Dylan Moran as an overly-
eccentric and mood-swinging manor-owner (a cynic mightsay he’s playing
himself, but there is more to him). This high level of acting talent all delivering
really help create the setting of rural Ireland and make it believable, as well as
carry the story and keep it focused – precisely what good acting should
achieve.
The other powerfulfactor behind Calvary’ssuccess is the story and the
themes that run throughout. As one can probably guess, even fromthe posters
alone, the subjectmatter is concerned with the Catholic church, and its role in
today’s modern society (to be precise, a modern ruralvillage). However, this is
not an agenda driven, overly-protective, pro-religion film (*cough* God’s Not
Dead *cough*): this is merely a film that showcases whatit is currently like to
live in this world, albeit in McDonagh’s darkly-comedic fashion. Itdoes
showcaseboth sides of the support; the somewhathypocriticaland
nonsensicalteachings of the church and people’s scepticism towards it, and

3. the overly judgemental, and very hateful side of the community, who make
assumptions towards Lavelle, a generally good man, and assumethat every
priest is the same: I won’tsay whatthey refer to, but you can make the guess.
Itreally keeps the story balanced, as while the people’s hatred of the church is
understandable, it also is illogical, and the same goes for the church’s reaction
to the community’s backlash. This is what drives the audience to continue
watching, as having a one-sided argument simply wouldn’twork.
There isn’t really any discernable weakness to the film: the only
potential exception is that the overall tone is unbalanced: in a similar senseto
IrvineWelsh’s Filth, the comedic aspect is effectively gone by the final third,
which is possibly for the better, but it feels that they could have balanced it so
the ‘lighter’ parts ran for the duration. There is also a general observation that,
while the writing is excellent, the overall direction and story-telling doesn’t
quite measure: it is by no means bad, simply not brilliant.
However, that is scraping the bottom of the nit-pick barrel, and there is
far too much in here of high quality to simply focus on the minor negatives.
Calvary is a breath of fresh air for film in this country; it is bleak and often
down-trodden, butpowerfuland effective. The pairing of Gleeson and
McDonagh seems to be working withouta hitch: I can only hope they continue
to make great productions as an actor-director duo.