Review: Apprentice to Murder
Blu-ray & DVD: Apprentice to Murder (1988)
The cinematic equivalent of a firework that takes forever to light only to go off with an unsatisfying and weird pop minutes after you were convinced it was a dud.
Apprentice to Murder tells the story of Billy (Chad Lowe), a full-time mill worker living in Pennsylvania in 1927. When not working he spends his time being beaten by his stereotype of an alcoholic father and drawing, a hobby he proves to be very good at. He seeks the help of local powwow doctor, John (Donald Sutherland), in hopes of finding a solution in curing his father’s alcoholism. John and Billy form an unlikely give and take friendship within which Billy is taught to read in return for drawing John strange symbols which John uses in his practices. Alongside this, Billy starts a relationship with fellow worker, Alice (Mia Sara), and plans with her to start a new life in Philadelphia. This plan however is brought into peril when problems rise in the form of the authorities questioning John’s unorthodox methods of healing.
If I were to sum up this film in one word it would easily be confused. The film prances about most of the time posing as a serious period drama, even boldly plastering “based on a true story” over it’s intro. But the film keeps drifting between plotlines and losing interest in whatever it’s doing so often it’s genuinely difficult to talk about in hindsight. Is it a period drama? Is it a tragic love tale? Is it a cryptic ghost story? It manages to be all these things and somehow absolutely nothing at the same time.
The pacing is godawful, spending the first hour of its 90 minute runtime building and building a number of themes and threads only to cover them up in the most half-assed ways you could imagine. It keeps dipping its toes into the supernatural but never going all the way with it. I kept expecting the third act to wrap up in an explosion of paranormal set pieces or a slow burn of manmade evil. In a weird twist of events it actually kind of does both, only in the most boring and contrived ways possible. There’s almost a feeling that the writer was attempting to make a serious biopic about the consequences of religious fanaticism only to remember they were actually commissioned to write an exorcist story and pro-religious healing narrative somewhere in the script’s third draft.
To say Apprentice to Murder is bad is an understatement. It’s a boring slog of a film, poorly paced with a confused sense of direction and lack of conviction its own messages. Its performances range from passable to pretty decent but are completely wasted on bland characters you’ve seen time and time again in films set around this time period. It is a genuine struggle for me to name a single thing I liked about this film.
It’s a shame because I think this really could have worked too. A story of a religious healer who’s so adamant in his own arrogant belief in himself and his God that he drags down with him an innocent but impressionable boy through the power of belief? Sure, that sounds great! But don’t tell me that this is a serious look at a man spiralling into his own selfish brand of madness then double back with scenes of paranormal activity that prove he was justified in it. The result is a frustrating and confusing end product.
Pass this at all costs unless you’re dead set on losing a whole 90 minutes of your life.
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Review by Joel from a disc kindly supplied by Arrow Films.
