{image1}Sometimes you just want to shout at the screen: "Get to the point!"
That's definitely the case with "The Reckoning," the new film from "The Acid House" director Paul McGuigan, based on Barry Unsworth's novel "Morality Play."
More than a quarter of the two-hour film, a murder mystery set in 14th century England, is long gone by the time McGuigan and his cast get down to business. First he demands that we endure some thoroughly unnecessary scene setting (we get the same information and more from flashbacks and dialogue that come later).
In a slow-moving picture like this one, we'd love to have that 30 minutes or more back.
That said, it's hard to fault the costumes, the set design or the story, even if the dialogue occasionally enters the realm of the hackneyed and if we're expected to make some serious suspensions of disbelief throughout.
A fugitive priest (Paul Bettany) hooks up with a ragtag band of declining actors led by Martin (Willem Dafoe), who've got some pressing problems of their own, one of which being that they need another actor. Problem solved.
When they enter a town to fix their cart they stumble upon the sentencing of a deaf/mute woman who has been convicted of the latest killing in a string of murders of young boys in the town.
But did she do it? Fingers certainly point at her, but also a local monk (Ewen Bremner).
Martin decides that the company can really get back atop its game by veering from the traditional stage fodder gleaned from the Bible and staging a play about the murder (the world's first topical theater?). When the actors start asking around for details of the murder from townspeople, they begin to doubt that the accused actually committed the crime.
Can the fugitive priest put his values aside and let her die for a crime she likely didn't commit? Can the band of actors survive its revolutionary attempt to change both the theater and its own fortune at the same time? Will their investigations solve the case? Will they live to tell?
All of these questions get answered and thankfully, once the cinematic ball gets rolling, "The Reckoning" is quite engaging. But, don't rush to the theater. If you miss the first part, you won't be any worse off for it.
"The Reckoning" opens Friday, June 4 at Landmark's Downer Theatre.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
