Big Picture Big Sound

"Priest" Likely to Succeed

After last year's disappointing "Legion", actor Paul Bettany and director Scott Stewart have returned with a more promising offering: "Priest", a visually satisfying film based on the graphic novel series of the same name by Korean artist Min-Woo Hyung. Viewers who aren't familiar with the original text will nonetheless be able to follow the story with ease, as there isn't much here that hasn't been seen before. However, rather than being a drawback, the challenge of identifying the familiar elements that come together to make up the pastiche of "Priest" is all part of the fun - as is the surprise of seeing these elements combined in some unexpected and entertaining ways.

The film opens with a none-too-promising flashback, setting up the basis of the story: a band of vampire hunters is ambushed in the midst of a would-be raid on a vampire "hive" and each line of dialogue in the thankfully brief sequence is one you've heard a hundred times before. We then shift gears and learn, through a nifty animated sequence, of the history of the long war between mankind and vampires, and a small number of humans possessing special vampire-fighting skills; those with such talents were taken from their families and (shades of the Jedi, perhaps?) trained to become warrior "priests". Over time the Big-Brother-esque Church that functions as a government in this post-apocalyptic world declared the vampire threat vanquished and decommissioned the priests. As the former warriors are marked with prominent cross-shaped facial tattoos, blending back into society isn't going too smoothly.

One particular priest, known as, yes, Priest (Paul Bettany), is called on to rejoin the fight when his young niece (Lily Collins), living on a hardscrabble subsistence farm out on the frontier with her parents, is kidnapped. The Priest suspects vampires are to blame - and he's right. He defies the commands of the Church in order to undertake his niece's rescue, joining up with the town sheriff (Cam Gigandet) who loves her and refuses to let her be killed. Through their pursuit we learn more about the vampires, and they're nothing like the moody Byronic charmers of gothic tradition. Instead, they are repulsive and almost featureless, except for their gaping, fanged mouths. A character explains at one point that the vampires evolved without eyes - which makes sense, as they are primarily creatures of the night. Of course, the idea of vampires evolving raises a whole other set of questions...

The abduction of the Priest's niece is, as expected, part of a larger scheme, one that brings our protagonist face to face with an old friend from his past - who's not so friendly anymore - and reveals some long-held family secrets. He is also reacquainted with the Priestess, a fellow warrior with whom he apparently shared an illicit romance. The aforementioned scheme has the Priest, Priestess, and sheriff racing against time to stop a runaway train (yes!) in order to save the city from - well, to say any more would be to give away one of the fun twists in the storyline.

"Priest" could have held up quite well visually without the 3D effects, and it's almost a shame that it wasn't allowed to stand on its own as a traditional release. There's an elegant balance to the composition of most of the shots, and a visual consistency throughout that serves as a reminder of the material's origin as a graphic novel. It feels as though Mr. Stewart, as director, is working from an encyclopedia of film and pop-culture references. It's possible to wonder if he is echoing Carl Dreyer in some of the Church tribunal scenes, channeling George Lucas in the washed out desert-scapes framing the tiny figure of the Priest against looming, ruined edifices, and outright quoting "The Matrix" in several of the fight scenes. There are also nods to "Blade Runner" in the towering city buildings covered in crawling neon, and a steampunk sensibility to the frontier world outside the city's borders. And as a bonus, Brad Dourif shows up in a small role, earning the film its requisite genre credit points.

"Priest" may not necessarily appeal to general audiences, but genre fans will enjoy themselves. Mr. Bettany brings just the right tone of resolute humorlessness to his role as the Priest, and he raises the practice of dramatic crouching to an art form in its own right. Maggie Q as the Priestess brings an elegant warmth to the proceedings. The film's conclusion hints at a sequel, and there seems to be plenty of untapped material in Hyung's series. Who knows? "Priest II" might have a prayer of being something to look forward to.