The Priest's Children (2013)

Don't listen to the Hype. It's awful

Best movie ever!

Blending excellent reporting and strong storytelling, this is a disturbing film truly stranger than fiction

This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama

I really enjoyed watching this film. The film will be screened in Baku, Azerbaijan in November, within the framework of the traditional European Film Festival being held every year. This drama-comedy film is awesome in its storyline, actors professionalism, and the topic. I really recommend watching this film to everyone. I am sure the audience in Baku will also love it :)Good luck Vinko Bresan!

A story that set in a small Croatian island. It is a comedy, but also a serious issue that the country is facing right now. So thanks to the filmmakers to foray this matter into a nice comical style movie. Yes, the presentation was unique, displayed everything in a sophisticated manner. It was based on a stage play and was in controversy for the portrayal of serious issue in such a shade and characters.The story commences with a young priest Don Fabijan who tell his tale to another priest. So the flashback begins where he was working in an island church. In that small town, the death rates are rising at an alarming rate, but birth rates are completely nil. Then he decides to make the balanced ratio with the help of a couple of other trustees. What follows is the confusions among people over the sudden changes in life order of the community.I got very interested when I heard about the movie for the first time. The title itself was tempting, after reading its synopsis I became desperate to see it. So kept my expectations as much possible low. In another angle I was hoping it not to be alike 'Nacho Libre' with a slightly altered character of Jack Black. Thank god it was a different than others of the similar kind.Recently I explored into some of the Croatian and its neighbouring region movies and I am happy for those including this fine comedy. I give you a green flag signal to go for it, but you should not expect anything extraordinary from this simple comedy.

You could get a few good laughs at few witty situations and that's it, other jokes are just too simplistic, just swears and contrasts with no buildup, e.g. priest is doing something you wouldn't expect him doing and so on, which for some reason works for Croatian audience, especially if the swears are in Croatian language. Although it starts fairly promising, of all the crazy funny possibilities that could have happened, nothing very complex or clever actually happens, character acts gets annoying as they continue to do ridiculous things which you would expect only in Aaron Seltzer movies. All characters are stereotypes, PTSD racist war veteran, mad woman, stupid cop and so on, to make cheesy short simplistic gigs all the more easier to put in the movie, most of them only funny to people that are familiar with the situation in the country.Movie with all its goofy characters, tries to send a serious critique to church, that just doesn't work in a silly comedy such as this one. Biggest mistake is that the movie, although it makes fun on the expense of everyone that a common man in Croatia talks bad about on daily basis (also a thing that is closely related to Croatian mentality) politicians, nationalists, priests, cops etc., revolves around church while trying to make it look as bad as it can. It mocks church in a way that is funny only to those who mock and dislike church (and there are many of those here, thus making such success in the theaters).If you like simple jokes on the expense of people you highly dislike, and you find profanity hilarious, than go for it, but if you expect anything more than that, or you do not enjoy making fun of people mostly in a mean and not clever way, this movie isn't for you.We just have to wait for another movie that will bring Croatian cinematography from the dead, this is just mindless fun for a common Joe, to relax and get his mind of everyday troubles. I can't say that I expected much from a movie made by taxpayers money (HRT, Croatian National Television, production).

Before watching this, I'd encountered mixed reviews for the movie, from raves, through "meh, it's was OK", to "absolute sh*t". Now... my opinion in the end is somewhere between the last two categories, and I'll explain why shortly...Someone mentions "authentic acting"... Oh really? Yeah, I guess it might pass as authentic to someone without ANY knowledge of the setting it's supposed to be in. Almost NONE of the actors make any attempt at sounding like any Croatian islander -> to someone from someone from another part of Croatia, to whom everyone in Dalmatia, despite its obvious linguistic variety and abundance of dialects, "sounds the same", yeah, it would be OK as it's a mishmash of whatever the actors think sounds Dalmatian, but to someone aware of how it's supposed to sound, it ends up being as "authentic" and "genuine" as someone suddenly doing a gangsta rap in the middle of a movie set in the Victorian period, only without the comic potential. Even if he did that so that it wouldn't sound like "any island in particular", it sounds like "no island ever, possibly, with a dash of the Tower of Babel, as no two sound alike".It's a problem that has plagued the Croatian cinematography incessantly ever since, ironically, its independence, and Brešan, unfortunately IS one of the torchbearers of that notion, that echoes even today through abysmal trainwrecks like Larin Izbor... but that's a different story altogether.Even after 16 years, Brešan seems unable to deviate from his "island + simple people + a "village idiot" (this time a "generic insane woman" and not a "generic dimwit", but it boils down to the same thing) + a comedy that grows into (or in this case, degenerates) a tragedy + "everything that's funny is revealed or hinted at in the trailer, so the true laughs are rare in between" with just a dash of "aftereffects of the war" formula, while still not understanding how the islands sound and function, viewing them from an almost colonialist perspective. Clichés are thrown around early on to establish an "atmosphere" and the main character, the likable Mikić is one the rare few whose acting might feel right or genuine, as he's not really supposed to be from the village, established to be an outsider of sorts...There is some good humor in here, however, ranging from subtle background stuff, body humor, to almost obvious gags (that don't aaallways work) and it almost seems like he'd thrive in an all-out farce, and that makes the "tragedy" bits all the more banal. They feel tacked on, forced, thrown in with no grace, just to drive in a point.The movie pokes fun and/or attacks a lot of aspects the Catholic church and clergy, in Croatia or in general, while not really religion itself, on many fronts, with varying success. One might not say the church itself, just the corruption inside it... Some stuff works, some doesn't... Some is subtle, some isn't. The hypocritical "enemies in public but friends / identical privately" aspect of (Croatian) politics is also mocked... The efficiency of the humor and its parody value varies from viewer to viewer I guess.I just hope that Brešan tries to experiment for once and tries to put a movie in another setting. If he's trying to draw attention to the islands, and their problems, he's just doing it wrong, ignoring or not understanding their culture. Completely wrong. The sad thing is that most people won't notice. And who can blame them when they've only been served stuff like this.This could've and should've been better.PS. The geography of the place also makes no sense at first glance, at least if we assume that people can't walk over water. It just looks bad at times, with characters entering the scene from a direction they simply shouldn't come from. I could be wrong and I'll gladly edit this if it turns out that I'm mistaken.