Film Roar

The Bridge of San Luis Rey (2004)

What could have been a very good movie, The Bridge of San Luis Rey (2004) suffers from an insurmountable lack of appeal that makes it watch able but barely memorable. The recent remake of the Thornton Wilder novel which was made into a 1929 part talkie and a later 1944 adaptation tells a genuinely interesting story. Brother Juniper (played here by Gabriel Byrne) has documented the fatal collapse of a rope bridge that connects two Andean mountains in Peru. By interviewing people who knew the five victims of the accident the monk attempts to discern whether their deaths were a punishment delivered by god or were purely accidental. The mere audacity of asking the question brings the ire of the Archbishop of Lima (played by Robert De Niro) who accuses the priest of heresy and threatens to burn both book and monk. The rest of the movie is an account of the relationships between a singer who is central to all characters (Pilar López de Ayala), a theater owner (Harvey Keitel), a socially inept Marquesa (Kathy Bates), the viceroy (F. Murray Abraham), twin mute theater workers (Mark and Michael Polish) and an AbbessGeraldine Chaplin. The impressive cast had given me hope for the movie but with the exception of a stellar performance by Chaplin and a very decent delivery by Abraham (a favorite actor of mine) there was little energy or charisma to the performance in the movie. Worse still Spain stood in for what should have been beautiful Peruvian hills and streets. The scenery and props felt fabricated not natural as does a great deal of the dialogue making for a disappointing waste of story and talent. Knowing what great things these actors are capable of I was left to wonder if perhaps a different director (the movie was directed by relative newcomer Mary McGuckian) might not have breathed a little life into the dead flop.