Absolution

Filmmaker Anthony Page's 1978 film starring Richard Burton is a damp squib of a Catholixploitation (if that's not a word, then...it should be) spiritual thriller that is oddly unmoving, despite a tricky screenplay by Anthony Shaffer (of Sleuth and The Wicker Man fame). The setting is a forbidding Catholic boys' boarding school in the U.K. countryside, where stern Father Goddard (Burton) is distressed that his favorite pupil, Stanfield (Dominic Guard), is falling under the spell of a footloose vagrant (Billy Connolly) camping nearby. Goddard has lectured his charges about the sanctity of the confessional, and the secretly rebellious Stanfield and his young co-conspirators use the sacred taboo that no priest may reveal what he hears (not even if homicide is involved) to play mind games with the stolid old true-believer priest. Unfortunately, Burton seems borderline somnambulant here, although his mellifluous voice is as rich as ever. Optional. (C. Cassady)