Priest - Blu-ray Review

'it might help you to nod off, safe in the knowledge that everyone will be exactly where you left them when you wake up'

How much you vilify Paul Bettany for appearing as the same character in Legion, The Da Vinci Code and Priest will depend on your capacity for enduring actors playing what is ostensibly the same role on a revolving carousel of plots. He isn't quite Sarah Jessica Parker, Katherine Heigl or Jason Statham but this is still a 'know what you're getting' film: Bettany growls and grunts his way through a load of ridiculous dialogue about (this time) vampires, before killing them dead in various ways, all whilst singularly failing to crack a smile. Quids in if you like this sort of thing.

Unlike Bettany's previous outings as the growly man who may or may not possess power beyond everyone else in the film, Priest has rather ill-advisedly got one eye on a potential sequel. Released at the very start of the summer season, it was never very likely to break box office records and pinning your final act on the hope that you can come back and reveal what happened is not a hugely smart move from director Scott Charles Stewart and/or writer Cory Goodman. The fact that said third act spends a good twenty-five minutes drawing everything it can out of a single location doesn't help matters, although it might help you to nod off, safe in the knowledge that everyone will be exactly where you left them when you wake up.

The middle third of the film reveals itself to be much better than either of its book ends. From roughly the segment where Bettany explains the 'point A, point B' rule to sidekick Cam Gigandet (average at best) to the time when our heroes leave Jericho, Priest manages to be quite fun. There's a couple of half-decent jumps, the only moment where Goodman remembers to write a good payoff line (it oddly goes to Gigandet) and some nicely realised locations. For a brief time, Stewart makes the film both watchable, pacy and effective.

Too soon though, the final third kicks in and the film enters inertia. If only every film that started with a Blade Runner 'burning' city scape (yes, this is another one) could live up to Ridley Scott's narrative mastery.

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'very much like this director/ actor partnership’s previous film, Legion, Priest’s conventional narrative is unsurprisingly poor and predictable throughout' - The Film Review