The Bridge of San Luis Rey

Thematically heavy costume drama (too weighty for the average viewer)

In 1714, five people fall to their deaths in the Andes when an "indestructible" rope-bridge breaks and Franciscan monk Brother Juniper (Gabriel Byrne) becomes obsessed with the tragedy, collecting personal notes on all the victims and writing a book on his conclusions: Five people, all dying of the same cause at the same instant, cannot be mere coincidence in an understandable human universe. He's put on trial by the Inquisition (which was running Spain and Peru at the time) for humanly trying to second-guess an Act of God. Robert De Niro plays the prosecuting Archbishop.

"The Bridge of San Luis Rey" (2004) is a costume drama taking place in Peru with a few scenes in Spain. Directed by Mary McGuckian, it's the third film based on the novel by Thornton Wilder.

The movie flashes back and forth between Juniper's trial and the lives of the five before their deaths. The victims are played by Kathy Bates, Harvey Keitel, Adriana Domínguez and Michael Polish. Émilie Dequenne appears as the daughter of Bates' character while Pilar López de Ayala is on hand as a theater actress. Geraldine Chaplin plays the mother nun and F. Murray Abraham appears as the Viceroy of Peru. Dominique Pinon is on hand as a fop while Mark Polish plays the twin brother of one of the victims.

Despite the stellar cast, this film is the furthest thing from a "blockbuster." Anyone who wants a blockbuster should turn around and get the fudge out of here. "The Bridge of San Luis Rey" demands intellectual investment and the willingness to entertain things not often discussed, like those in the book of Job. The movie is a call to endure the pilgrimage of this world even when it doesn't seem possible or desirable to do so. It is a call to persevere in faith even when the systems of belief turn against us and we don't understand.

The secondary theme is just as significant: How do we accept providence when those in posit...