First Reformed (2018)

An ex-military chaplain (Ethan Hawke) is going through a personal crisis. Currently, he is the pastor of a small historical church with a sparse parish. When a pregnant woman (Amanda Seyfried) asks him to counsel her depressed husband (Philip Ettinger), it will challenge his beliefs to their core. Directed by Paul Schrader, this is easily his best film since MISHIMA back in 1985. Make no mistake about it, this is a political film with an agenda but it's done with passion and artistry as opposed to those godawful Stanley Kramer social message movies. Are churches now corporations rather than places of God? Is the destruction of our planet the result of man's greed or is it God's plan? It's a provocative and challenging film about ideas and in many ways, it's as ascetic as an Ingmar Bergman movie. In fact, it's even shot in the old 1.37 Academy ratio rather than wide screen. This being a Paul Schrader film one expects a fiery conclusion and the ominous chords on the soundtrack are foreboding. But then Schrader does something unforgivable. He sabotages his own movie with a laughable ending. Was he just jerking us around before? I'd like to think he just couldn't think of a decent ending so he gave us the crap he came up with. It just about ruins the movie though. I suggest leaving about 5 minutes before the movie ends. With Cedric Kyles (usually billed as Cedric The Entertainer), Michael Gaston and Victoria Hill.