MOVIES REVIEWS

For Greater Glory Movie Review

ByChiara Spagnoli Gabardi

Oct 19, 2014

Title: For Greater Glory

Director: Dean Wright

Starring: Andy Garcia, Eva Longoria, Eduardo Verastegui, Rubén Blades, Peter O’Toole.

The director (and visual effects supervisor) who is best known for fantasy movies such as ‘The Lord of the Rings’ trilogy, and ‘The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe,’ tackles an important and neglected moment in history: the Cristero War.

“La Cristiada” was an attempted counter-revolution against anti-clericalism of the ruling Mexican government. During the 1920s, the country was thrust into civil war when President Plutarco Calles outlawed Catholicism, banned religious activity, confiscated all church property and exiled clergy. Priests and nuns that protested were arrested or publicly executed and hung on display from roadside posts. Rebel factions formed by schoolboys to farmers to artisans rose up and thus started the Cristero War.

Although this part of history, that usually isn’t part of school’s programs, could have been interesting, the plot of ‘For Greater Glory’ spares no cliches. We have a tight-knit family divided by politics, a sensitive priest urging children to fight for their beliefs, the atheist legendary General Gorostieta who is hired to lead the directionless rebels against Calles and will somehow be touched by the heavenly light and the indoctrinated kid who embodies the Lamb of God.

The speed of narration is highly antiquate, and has the flavour of a rambling political biopic that aspires to the long gone old-Hollywood romanticism.

The actors are pretty good (Andy Garcia, Eva Longoria, Eduardo Verastegui, Rubén Blades, Peter O’Toole) although the heavy-handed message of proselytism gives an irksome depiction of Mexico’s Cristero War.

If understandably the US got the immediate release, it took almost two years   for the movie to get distribution in European countries such as Italy, albeit the Bel paese’s Catholic Weltanschauung is in line with that of the movie.

Technical: B-

Acting: B-

Story: C

Overall: C+

Written by: Chiara Spagnoli Gabardi

For Greater Glory Movie Review

By Chiara Spagnoli Gabardi

Chiara Spagnoli Gabardi, is a film critic, culture and foreign affairs reporter, screenwriter, film-maker and visual artist. She studied in a British school in Milan, graduated in Political Sciences, got her Masters in screenwriting and film production and studied at the Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute in New York and Los Angeles. Chiara’s “Material Puns” use wordplay to weld the title of the painting with the materials placed on canvas, through an ironic reinterpretation of Pop-Art, Dadaism and Ready Made. She exhibited her artwork in Milan, Rome, Venice, London, Oxford, Paris and Manhattan. Chiara works as a reporter for online, print, radio and television and also as a film festival PR/publicist. As a bi-lingual journalist (English and Italian), who is also fluent in French and Spanish, she is a member of the Foreign Press Association in New York, the Women Film Critics Circle in New York, the Italian Association of Journalists in Milan and the Federation of Film Critics of Europe and the Mediterranean. Chiara is also a Professor of Phenomenology of Contemporary Arts at IED University in Milan.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *