THE CRIME OF FATHER AMARO/ EL CRIMEN DEL PADRE AMARO
December 15th 2002
The Mexican film, El Crimen del Padre Amaro, was nominated in the category of Best Foreign Language Film for the Academy Awards for the films of 2002.
When it was released in Mexico in mid-2002, it received a large amount of press coverage which highlighted its 'controversial' Catholic Church issues. The film was popular at the Mexican box-office. At the time a number of Mexican Bishops expressed their protest at the themes of the film. The secretary of SIGNIS Mexico, Rodolfo Guzman, wrote more positively of the film's technical qualities, of the treatment of the characters and their interactions, especially concerning money issues and clerical celibacy as well as the challenges to the church which such films offer to look again at structures and abuses.
Towards the end of 2002, the film was released commercially in the United States and received a negative review from the critic of the American Catholic Conference classifications office. The film was judged as vicious and corrosive and referred to some sequences as hurtful to Catholics. As with so many issues, regional and national sensibilities differ considerably and have to be taken into account when making recommendations or issuing condemnations.
El Crimen is based on a book dating from 1875, a reminder that problems of relationships between church and governments and the potential for corruption as well as difficulties with clerical celibacy are issues of long standing. This is particularly the case for nations which have centuries-old Hispanic tradition from Catholic countries and societies so different from those influenced by the 16th century Reformation, most of the countries of Europe as well as the United States.
It needs to be acknowledged that the style of the film is that of the telenovella so popular in recent years in Latin America. Critics from less emotional societies find the telenovella style particularly melodramatic, highly volatile and emotional with characters and situations often presented in broad and sweeping strokes. This is an accepted way of storytelling. As the critic for Variety shrewdly pointed out, the audiences for which El Crimen was geared would have no trouble in appreciating its style.
The Catholic Hispanic (and Iberian) culture also has a long history of what might be called anti-clericalism. 'The Mission' is a cinema reminder of 18th century clashes between civil authorities and the church in South America which led to pressure on the Pope in 1773 to suppress the Jesuits. During the 19th and 20th centuries there were the revolutions for independent nationhood as well as the 1930s Spanish Civil War. This is true of Mexico, so it is not unexpected to find a film that takes a critical look at the local church. By the 1940s, Graham Greene had written a classic novel of such Catholicism in The Power and the Glory.
El Crimen del Padre Amaro has been described as anticlerical. It is truer to say that the film is anti-clericalism rather than anti-clerical. It is critical of the power plays (clericalism) of some clergy, of misconduct by some priests and members of religious orders who profess to live exemplary lives. It does not say that all clergy are like this. In fact, one of the heroes of the film is a priest who tries to live the Gospel injunctions of service to the poor and oppressed but who becomes the victim of the power plays, this clericalism. The film also presents sequences of bizarre and supersitious religious practices. The broad sweep does not necessairly imply general condemnation as is sometimes felt by audiences whose sensitivity is bruised by such presentations. A film about individual or group police corruption or political corruption is not necessarily anti-police or anti-government.
With the contemporary contempt for official organisations (the misconduct of financial corporations, the lack of credibility of government action), it is not unexpected that Church organisations are targets for criticism. Since the Church has always acknowledged that it comprises both saints and sinners, that the Church continually needs reforming (the old Latin adage, Ecclesia semper reformanda), the actions of sinners, no matter how distasteful and hurtful for those strongly committed to their Church, are able to be dramatised, criticised and, where necessary, be held accountable.
These are the implications of a film like El Crimen del Padre Amaro. Documented material would indicate that the lack of commitment to vows of celibacy are not rare, that officials can be corrupted by financial ambition or greed, that drugs, dealing and export are a continual problem in many Latin American countries. These are some of the topics of El Crimen. The implication of the critique offered by the film of several of the central characters is that this is not what the Church professes and not what its members expect it to be like. So, the film offers a challenge to an examination of conscience and the need for reform.
