Just watched it, and it was really good. I see an inordinate amount of inexplicable hate toward this film, and am guessing it's because it's netflix. It's my contention that many hollyweird studios are attempting to keep netflix down by bashing them with all their minions on boards like this, and imdb, etc.
Welp, it's not going to work. People like me, and others are going to point out this film is just fine, and well worth watching.
Netlix can produce great flicks, like "Hold the Dark," or good ones, like "The Ritual." But "Apostle" ain't one of 'em.
The plot is of course reminiscent of "The Wicker Man." The first half is a decent set-up; a little dull, but nice and mysterious with a fantastic location and village set. Unfortunately, the second half devolves into half-baked horror cheese with a couple of random torture scenes to supposedly keep things "exciting."
I was shocked at how bad the second half was -- bad flow, no finesse, ill-conceived, lack of consistency, too ambiguous -- just lousy wannabe-horror filmmaking. It's like the director needed 20-25 more minutes to properly tell the story, but was pressured to keep the movie as close to 2 hours as he could and so clumsily forced the footage together in the second half.
One example of the dubious consistency is the power struggle abruptly introduced in the last act. Up to that point there was zero indication that Quinn wasn't happy with his brother Malcolm's leadership of the cult on the island. This plot turn suggested clumsy scriptwriting.
But I found themes in the movie provocative upon reflection, particularly its commentary on human-made hybrid religions and the potential for corruption and abuse thereof. Think Jeroboam's syncretic religion when the northern kingdom of Israel broke from Judah; he concocted two golden calf idols and appointed illegitimate "priests." It was influenced by Judaism and featured some of its trappings, but left out the most important part (God).
The movie needs a "Director's Cut" that runs at least 2.5 hours. As it is, the second half is all fudged up as far as effective storytelling goes.
I like how The Apostle thrust us into the cult without fleshing out any back story of the internal squabbles. It gave a sense of mystery as well as being from the perspective of the "outlander". The film left some things to the imagination, and that was actually appreciated. For me, this film is very watchable, and a solid 7.5/10.
shareIt's a good point.
It just seemed like things went wrong in the second half, like the director was rushed to complete the film and expositional scenes were left on the cutting room floor.
I'd like to see a Director's Cut some day that makes more sense of the material and just has more finesse in the second half. As it is, something went awry.
I won't say that this is one of the better ones on netflix, but I do think it's a good alternative to the unoriginal crap coming out of Hollywood.
Some of the foriegn made films are way better than what Hollywood can come up with.
And I like that Netflix has no shortage of foriegn made productions that bear no resemblance to what Hollywood can
produce.