Semiquincentennial Movie Project #27: The Rosary Murders

 

 

 

 

The Semiquincentennial  Movie Project is an ongoing celebration of the 250th anniversary of the founding of the United States. During the course of this project your humble blogger is choosing a movie a week to represent each of the 50 states in the Union, as well as a movie scheduled for 4th of July weekend that will represent the nation's capitol, Washington D.C. The order of the weekly entries will coincide with the order of each state's entry into the fold (although, not necessarily coinciding with the date of their entry into said fold).

 

Week #27: Maryland -

 

 

The state of Michigan was established on  January 26, 1837

Details about Michigan:

State bird: robin

State flower: apple blossom

State tree: white pine

Additional historical trivia:

48222. The only zip code in the world that has 0 population. It's a boat that floats on the Detroit River and delivers mail to other ships.

The state is divided into the "upper peninsula" and the "lower peninsula", and is one of only 5 states that does not have all of it's land mass in one contiguous mass.  

"Yoopies" (not to be confused with "yuppies") is the name for people who reside in the upper peninsula. U.P.s, get it? 

There are more lighthouses in Michigan than any other state, due to the need for them on the Great Lakes.

Speaking of the Great Lakes, Michigan is the state where the wreck of the famous Edmund Fitzgerald occurred.

Credit (or blame, as your political affiliation may be) Michigan for the Republican Party. The first Republican Party meeting took place in Ripon. 

Famous people born in Michigan: Casey Kasem, Tom Selleck, Madonna, Henry Ford, Charles Lindbergh, Michael Moore, Jim Bakker and numerous sports figures, including Magic Johnson, Serena Williams and George Gipp (the original "Gipper").

 

 

 

The Rosary Murders (1987):

The Rosary Murders may be a difficult movie for some. For one thing, one of the primary things that hinge on the plot is the fact that the main character, a Catholic priest, hears the confession of a man who admits that he is committing a rash of murders, but that he, the murderer, is not going to stop. But since the priest has heard about it through a confessional, he is bound by his profession and faith in his role as a priest to not reveal this to anyone. (And, by the way, that is apparently a true fact in the Catholic Church; the priest could be subject to excommunication. I got this from a website in which a real priest in the Church addressed the issue).

The other issue, and this is the one that may push this movie into a realm that you might not want to address, even if you are watching it alone. The main criminal character is committing these murders as a result of guilt and blame against the Church for it's lapse of strength in getting him to stop committing incest with his daughter, which ultimately led to her committing suicide.

Having been forewarned, I leave it up to you whether to continue even reading this blog entry.

The movie is based on the first book in a series of murder mysteries which was written by William X. Kienzle.   The screenplay was written by none other than Elmore Leonard, a man who could fashion good nail-biting scripts on his own. 

William X. Kienzle

Elmore Leonard

 

The problem early on is the almost supersonic speed in which it opens, seemingly trying to jam about a hundred pages of story into the first 15 minutes. However, if you can go along with this, the rest of the movie does manage to slow down enough for you to follow along.

The first murder is not so nearly as gruesome as one might expect. In fact, given the circumstances, you might not even realize a murder had taken place. The priest (and all the victims are either priests or nuns) is on life support and dies. It is only revealed a little later in the film that his life support equipment had been unplugged.

Father Robert Koesler (Donald Sutherland) is introduced as he converses with a girl who confides in him that she wants to resign from the nunnery in order to get married. Unfortunately for her, she becomes the second victim in a series of murders that targets Detroit Catholic Church leaders. The murderer has taken to leaving his calling card with the victims; a black rosary wrapped around the victim's left hand.

 

A love interest (of sorts) makes it's way into the film as a female reporter, Pat Lennon (Belinda Bauer), investigates these deaths. The "love interest" portion is fully on Pat, however. As a Catholic priest, Father Koesler is not allowed such human frailties as "sexual attraction". (I'm not going into any outside history with this, so just chill...) 

 

Also involved in this story is a police lieutenant. Kosnicki (Josef Sommer), who thinks that not only can Koesler help solve the crime, but also that maybe Koesler is hiding something. 

 

Which, in fact, Koesler is... See, the murder approached Koesler via the confessional booth and basically told the priest flat out that he was the murder. This leaves Koesler in a moral dilemma, since as a priest he is bound by certain rules of the Church that he can't reveal anything he heard in confession, including the admission of murder.  

Koesler thus becomes an amateur sleuth, trying to determine the identity of the killer without crossing the threshold of the sanctity of the confessional. He only has as his primary clue is that the murderer is committing his acts because of the death of his 16 year old daughter. (It is only later that he discovers the actual truth; her suicide brought on by remorse from the illicit, immoral actions of her father.)

 

I can't decide whether the solution to this crime is ingenious or just plain stupid. Without giving it away entirely, the solution has it's roots in something Biblical (much like the way Dr. Phibes disposes of his enemies in The Abominable Dr. Phibes). 

Just a note: I rather liked Kienzle's Father Koesler mysteries when I read them back in the 80's and 90's. It's too bad this film didn't strike a nerve with the public, as I would have liked to see some of his other mysteries make it to the big screen.  (I feel the same way about Rabbi Small, who unfortunately only got a short-lived TV series that went nowhere...)

The Rosary Murders was not a huge hit at the box office. It only pulled in about $1.5 million in ticket sales. There is no information I could find on it's budget, but with Donald Sutherland an Charles Durning probably getting a decent paycheck, I'm betting it was what would be considered a bomb. As a matter of fact, aside from Sutherland, who is usually pretty good on film, most of the rest of the cast is subpar. Almost as if they were just mailing it in... Which probably goes a long way in explaining both why this movie did not fare well, as well as why there was never another Koesler movie.

My opinion is that the film is OK. But please, don't let the mediocre film deter you from diving into Kienzle's  mysteries. Like Harry Kemelman's Rabbi Small mysteries, you get a really good amateur sleuth who is also a religious leader in the community. You will get a thrill out of the inner working of the religious community as well as a fairly good mystery. In fact, if the movie had just exerted a bit more effort into portraying the interaction of the characters on the religious side, I think this movie might have fared better. (Mind Over Murder, the 3rd book in the series, would have made a good source for film).

Until next time, drive safely.

Quiggy