_Priest_ reviewed by Cynthia Fuchs When I attended a preview of Antonia Bird's _Priest_, the theater was being picketed (mostly by young white men in suits: this probably had something to do with the well-to-do downtown location of the theater). Protestors carried signs which annnounced, "Catholics outraged with the film _Priest_!''; another group announced themselves with a big red and gold banner reading "Tradition, Family, Propriety.'' When I asked one of the picketers if he had seen the movie, he said no, and he was resolved to avoid seeing it. The controversy over the film and this resulting no-budging attitude recall previous controversies, for instance, the one over Scorsese's _Last Temptation of Christ_ (when protestors objected to the idea that Jesus would have sex with his wife, Mary Magdalene). Similarly, the problem non-viewers are having with _Priest_ is that they've heard that the film depicts two priests having consensual sex, one with a woman, and the other with a man. The protestor I spoke with doesn't want to see this. Which means, in effect, that he won't even consider any other issues raised by the film, because he won't know what they are: priests having sex, especially gay sex, is apparently beyond thought. Granted, such resistance is largely an effect of advertising. Miramax, as might be expected, has made promotional hay from the uproar, inviting Catholic officials to see the film and discuss it in theaters (to be sure, after seeing it, many have condemned it), and publicly thinking twice about opening the film on Good Friday, and then deciding not to open it on that day. Unfortunately, this strategy tends to reduce the film to bare-bones Controversy with a big C. And Bird's movie deserves more than that. It's a careful, deliberately paced study of young, rigidly idealistic Father Greg Pilkington's (Linus Roache) coming to terms not only with his gayness but also with the daily contradictions of being a priest in a poor section of Liverpool, where parishoners survive through a combination of reslience and intolerance; some even display open-mindedness. (Most of these folks are anonymous: their angry glares or averted eyes sufficing for character development.). As his designated mentor father Matthew (Tom Wilkinson) warns him early on, a priest must negotiate between the real world and religious-institutional rules. In other words, even as he's absolutely passionate in his faith and sense of calling, Greg has to learn to be tolerant of human "weakness'' (including his own). Matthew conveniently offers Greg's first object lesson, since he's sleeping with their housekeeper, Maria (Cathy Tyson). The movie gets around any possible questions concerning class inequity in this situation by granting Maria a speech declaring their love for each other and her specific insistence that Matthew not leave the order or marry her. And it's soon plain that this mutually agreeable relationship between two articulate adults is the least of Greg's problems. A girl (Christine Unsworth) confesses to him that her father molests her; then the father confesses too, insisting that it's "natural'' right (he's portrayed as such a venomous brute, it's easy to know what to think about him). Here Greg faces a familiar ethical dilemma (much like the one confronting Montgomery Clift in Hitchcock's _I Confess_ or Robert DeNiro in _True Confessions_: whether to reveal a confidence that puts lives at risk). He has to choose between adhering to regulations (the sanctity of the confessional contract) and making an immediate, worldly difference (saving the girl from further abuse). All this suggests that the "gay issue'' is secondary, which isn't exactly true - all these moral questions are entangled. In making these connections, the film occasionally veers into sentimentality and melodrama (with movie-of-the-weekish urgency). This is my point: even if there is more going on here than a priest's sexuality (which he seems quite able to resolve according to church rules, though this may be beside the point if you refuse to see past the fact that he's self-identified as gay), anything else (where the film is formally weak or strong, other questions it raises) will be lost in the shuffle. The gay priest - having pretty regular, inexplicit movie sex, after all, complete with clasping hands to signal climax - is _the_ inflammatory matter, the one that solicits picketers. Which returns us to the question of marketing. Because of the controversy, the film will likely garner a supportive queer crowd (when I saw it, the audience was mostly white, male, and gay, and they applauded at the end). Will other viewers go or stay away because of the press surrounding the movie? Controversy is as valid a way to promote a movie as any other, and it's "free'' publicity (it can cost a lot to promote Schwarzenegger with a big-balloon-likeness in Manhattan). But it can be reductive, tiresome, and annoying, especially as it invites comparisons with other sensationalizing modes of cultural exchange. (The most obvious example being OJTV as a way to "address'' issues of spousal abuse, racism, the social uses of sports-heroes, etc.). This kind of exchange can easily turn into non-exchange, concealing important questions about responsibility, representation, and yes, tolerance. Instead, it encourages an either-or system of judgment (bad or good, see it or don't see it), which can become a kind of censorship in itself. Cynthia Fuchs teaches film/media studies and is coordinator of the queer studies project at George Mason University. Copyright by Cynthia Fuchs. All rights reserved. Please do not reprint this review without the permission of the author. This review originally appeared in the Philadelphia _City Paper_.