Director: Rian Johnson
Starring: Daniel Craig, Josh O'Connor, Glenn Close, Josh Brolin, Mila Kunis, Kerry Washington, Jeremy Renner
Running Time: 144 minutes
Synopsis: Young priest and former boxer Jud Duplenticy (Josh O'Connor) is assigned to an upstate New York parish where Monsignor Jefferson Wicks (Josh Brolin) presides over a small congregation. Jud finds Wicks' behaviour intentionally boorish, and meets Wicks' loyal assistant Martha (Glenn Close) and regular attendees including lawyer Vera (Kerry Washington), her adopted son and failed politician Cy, despondent doctor Nat (Jeremy Renner), a fading author, and a cellist with a health ailment (Cailee Spaeny). When a murder is committed, local police chief Geraldine (Mila Kunis) and renowned private detective Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig) investigate.
Running Time: 144 minutes
Synopsis: Young priest and former boxer Jud Duplenticy (Josh O'Connor) is assigned to an upstate New York parish where Monsignor Jefferson Wicks (Josh Brolin) presides over a small congregation. Jud finds Wicks' behaviour intentionally boorish, and meets Wicks' loyal assistant Martha (Glenn Close) and regular attendees including lawyer Vera (Kerry Washington), her adopted son and failed politician Cy, despondent doctor Nat (Jeremy Renner), a fading author, and a cellist with a health ailment (Cailee Spaeny). When a murder is committed, local police chief Geraldine (Mila Kunis) and renowned private detective Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig) investigate.
What Works Well: The second sequel is both more intimate and more ambitious. Writer and director Rian Johnson finds a brooding church setting to host personal agendas and broader societal commentary, and wisely de-emphasizes detective Blanc in favour of a conflicted main protagonist in Father Jud. Carrying heavy luggage from the past (he killed a man in the boxing ring) and confronted by the spooky history of his new parish and an unhinged Monsignor Wicks, Jud stumbles upon a compelling mystery. Josh O'Connor and Josh Brolin are effective counterpoints across compassion and delusion, and beneath the murder plot resides clever discourse about the role of organized religion, from comforting those in need to raising the sword in battles real and imagined.
What Does Not Work As Well: The running time is undisciplined in an attempt to cram in a few too many sub-stories. Beyond the main characters, most of the cast members never move beyond "making up the numbers".
Key Quote:
Father Jud: You're right. It's storytelling. The rites and the rituals. Costumes, all of it. It's storytelling. I guess the question is, do these stories convince us of a lie? Or do they resonate with something deep inside us that's profoundly true, that we can't express any other way except storytelling?
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