Sir Sean Connery and Christian Slater star in this tale of intrigue and murder in an Italian abbey, adapted from the Umberto Eco novel. Connery plays William of Baskerville, a monk with distinctly Holmesian leanings, complete with precise logic and a great obsession with uncovering the truth. Slater is his Watson of sorts, playing the elder monk�s apprentice, a young man who is neither as cynical nor perceptive as his master. They arrive at the abbey intending to take part in a discussion between two orders of monks who have differing interpretations of Christ�s message, but due to William�s reputation for solving problems the abbot enlists their help in uncovering the killer of a young illuminator.
The film is thoroughly enjoyable, with the period recreated brilliantly and the abbey is a perfect location. The plot is sound with a well-concealed ending and some decent red herrings along the way. However the suspense is not as taut as it could be at many points, with too many lingering shots of the surrounding mountains and some hurried scenes. And when the killer is finally uncovered, his motive is a little unsatisfying if you were trying to guess the culprit throughout.
However, while it is effective enough on its own, anyone who has read the original novel will probably be disappointed. Much of the religious discussions on the nature of heresy are dropped (with at most 2 mentions of the Dolcinites), necessarily so for a big screen adaptation, and the script instead focuses on the crimes, while making the Inquisitor Bernardo a much more prominent character at the expense of skimming over the dispute between the monk orders. You really don�t feel the meticulous approach of William and his application of logic, in conflict with the race against time to solve the killings before the arrival of the papal delegation.
All this is perfectly sensible to fit the running time. What does grate slightly is some events being inserted at the expense of others from the novel, seemingly unnecessarily so, and the finale being changed to make it slightly less downbeat. None of which I will reveal here, because as I said, if you haven�t read the book then these things won�t matter to you. What disappoints the most however, is the short shrift given to the book�s most important and foreboding character, the abbey�s library. |
