Priest

Have you ever caught yourself watching a film and lamenting the lack of multiple, interminable sequences of characters racing in a straight line through a flat, barren desert on motorcycles? If so, Priest 3-D has arrived to ameliorate that dearth of dynamism. The first time it happened, I'll admit it was a bit striking. The second time, I began to grow tired of it. Around the 38th time, I realized the Director considered these as counting for action scenes. Outside all the wasteland hot-rodding, there are at most 3 set pieces in the film with only the climax lasting more than 3 minutes. The only truly unforgivable sin for a painfully stupid film to commit is that of being boring and sadly, Priest is profoundly guilty of this transgression.

Paul "charisma" Bettany stars in this Golgothan slog and in a curious career move, decides to phone his star vehicle performance in. I've seen roadkill register a more involving presence. He's supported by Cam "ratboy" Gigandet, who should have his screen actors guild revoked, because whatever the hell he was doing in front of the camera, it sure wasn't acting. Rounding out this somnambulistic troika is Karl "Bones in Star Trek was a fluke" Urban, who lets his contact lenses shoulder the dramatic weight of his character. Seriously, this is the most unappealing group of performers imaginable, and to say witnessing their interactive chemistry was like watching paint dry would be malicious and unfair to the subtle nuance of actually watching paint dry. Oh, and also Maggie Q, because, why not?

The sad thing is that there is some nice production design going on here. I liked the world they created quite a bit. It was derivative as hell, shamelessly pilfering from Blade Runner, 1984 and a slew of vastly superior Westerns, but it gelled nicely into a cohesive whole that managed to pop onscreen without needing to be explained. The action, what little there was of it outside the aforementioned motocross meltdown, was well shot, competently edited and constructed with as much flair as the budget would allow. The 3-D post conversion was nicely handled, rendering surprising depth to the bleak, beautiful world the film inhabited. I was enjoying myself just fine for 45 minutes or so. I love movies so damn much that I can give a pass to most anything that presents me with a palette I find aesthetically pleasing, but concept art and technical craftsmanship can only get you so far. Any film, even and especially ones as insultingly, mind bogglingly stupid as Priest, need a heart beating inside them to activate the cinematic circulatory system and give the creation life. That heart is the flesh and blood performances, and in that aspect, Priest comes up empty handed, leaving the audience to stare solemnly at a beautifully preserved corpse.

There is also a special place in hell reserved for films that so monumentally waste the talents of Brad Dourif. For shame.