Sexy Hot Priests?

#6: Into Temptation
I just like Jeremy Sisto.

Setting that aside, this is a fine film. Sisto plays an inner-city parish priest whose sparsely attended masses and slightly off-center sermons belie the actual man who occupies the role and can't quite tamp down real human emotions behind the doctrinal and institutional walls that separate the priesthood from the laity.

Sisto is great in this role. It would be easy to depict this character as torn, or tortured, or tempted (aren't all movie priests all of the above or, alternatively, gay?). But Sisto's Father John is just a priest. Not gay. Not excessively tortured. Not really contemplating leaving the priesthood. Not solving crime or sleeping with his sister. He's just a guy whose taken on a tedious job tending to a blue collar flock and who takes his duty to save his confessors as seriously as you would hope he would if it were you in the confession booth. Confronted by both real pain and love, Father John just tries to help. That sounds way cheesier than the film actually is.

One unremarkable day, Father John hears a preemptive confession from a woman who intends to kill herself on her birthday and seeks ablution for her sins, both current and future. Unable to just let her go her way, Sisto's character sets off to rescue her. His search leads him into a world of prostitution, strangely engaged librarians, pornography, and urban violence and decay. At the same time, an old girlfriend comes back into his life, newly divorced and still carrying a torch. Here is where you expect him to struggle, to reconsider, to waver. Sisto manages to relay deep and conflicting emotions but none of the ones you might expect.

Once again, Starz is screened this little gem with DVD projection, which is doubly sad given what appears to be a nicely executed cinematographic scheme. Damn you Starz!

This film does slow well. It leads the viewer up to the movie priest clichés but avoids them without resorting to tricks or ill-conceived cinema interventions. If you can get past the sincere depiction of a quietly compelling faith this is a fine film. It doesn't exactly endorse the Church nor does it put its faith in the magic of faith but, in the end, the hero is a slightly pudgy, fairly geeky, sorta hot, priest...