Luther Movie Review

How refreshing to see a movie where following the Bible and a love for Christ are shown without irony or humor. Or a “look at these strange creatures” detached feeling. Or a hip “ain’t God cool” vibe. Luther is just a straight story about one of the most significant lives in history.

Joseph Fiennes is Martin Luther. We first see him panicking in a thunderstorm and vowing to become a monk if he lives. He becomes a brilliant but guilt-ridden monk. He is sent to Rome on some business and sees that Rome has become "a circus" as a couple of different characters say. Then other events take place that send Luther toward his rebellion against abuses in the Catholic Church which the Church, needing money, will not admit are abuses. To be fair, there are those in the Church hoping for reform, but many of them consider Luther to be going too far in his criticisms. Things begin to spin out of control as people begin to believe they are oppressed politically as well as spiritually. Luther must live with the consequences of his writings and actions. One wonders, if Luther hadn't been away for a year in the castle, could he have prevented the Peasant Revolt?

The viewer gets a vague sense of the dangers individuals faced making choices, but probably there is no way to adequately show how much risk there was to every word or move for some. One does get a sense of the confusion and difficulty faced by those in power.

The movie moves pretty quickly and it’s hard to get a sense of the time passing. Luther spent almost a year in Wartburg Castle, but that is not understood just by watching the movie. I guess Martin Luther deserves an HBO miniseries like John Adams.

Peter Ustinov is fantastic as Fredrick the Wise. Frankly, I wish the movie had been made 30 years ago with Ustinov as Luther.

For some background on Luther, read Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Lutherby Roland Bainton or just the Wiki article.

Luther (the film) is not as great as A Man For All Seasons, but not many films are. However, it is very well done and certainly worth your time.

Luther, directed by Eric Till, written by Camille Thomasson and Bart Gavigan, starring Joseph Fiennes, Jonathan Firth, Peter Ustinov. 123 minutes. 2003.

Burn After Reading Movie Review

Joel and Ethan Coen have an unusual and dark view of the world that they brilliantly project through a variety of genres. And they use much more swearing than is really necessary. In fact Burn After Reading is rated R for “pervasive language” among other things. I’ll talk a little more about that later.

Osborn Cox (John Malkovich) is an analyst working for the CIA who gets demoted so he quits. He decides to write a memoir. His cheating wife (Tilda Swinson) decides to divorce him and the lawyer tells her to get all his financial information. She copies his files including his memoirs. When the disk is found in the ladies locker room at a gym called Hardbodies, Chad (a hilarious Brad Pitt) thinks he’s found some top secret documents worth some “reward” money. He and Linda Litzke (Frances McDormand), who wants several body sculpting surgeries, decide to try for the money. Cox is a jerk however, and instead of just telling them they don’t have anything, he causes them to think they have something really important and valuable. Somehow George Clooney figures into all this, first as the man Mrs. Cox is cheating with, then he is with Linda. It all gets tangled up Coen Brothers style and there is no “happily-ever-after.”


Why do the Coens find excessive swearing so invigorating? John Malkovich basically spends the movie saying “WTF?” Only he doesn’t abbreviate. However, Malkovich does a fantastic job of being a jerk and the swearing seems like something his character actually would say, not something forced into the script for humor or shock like Pappy O’Daniel in O Brother, Where Art Thou?. Basically everyone in this movie is a moron, but that could be expected as it’s in Washington, D.C. Burn After Reading is slow paced and not the best Coen Brothers movie, but it is funny and a fully enjoyable black comedy if that’s your thing.

There, now I’ve written a review of a Coen Brothers movie without using the word “quirky” other than in this sentence, of course.