PG-13 2023 Biblical Comedy/Drama
I understand why reviewers seem to relish lashing out at movies they don’t like: they can’t get two hours of their lives back and want to enact payback. I want to think I’m above that but I saw an advance screening of The Book of Clarence tonight and want to take it out on someone. The Book of Clarence is god awful.
The Book of Clarence is set in 33AD in the days leading up to Jesus’ crucification. Clarence is the town n’er-do-well, unlike his twin brother, the apostle, Thomas. Clarence doesn’t believe in anything. Clarence is a drug dealing gambler with a debt that will cost him his life if he doesn’t pay it back in a month. He decides that if he also becomes an apostle, maybe his life will be spared. Then he decides he could make some money if he staged miracles pretending to be the messiah. During his journey he comes to know God does exist and that Jesus is the true messiah. Unfortunately, the Romans convict Clarence for proclaiming himself a messiah and sentence him to be crucified. Then the movie depicts him being violently crucified.
There may be a way to make the movie I just described and have it be good. This wasn’t it. This movie was a tonal mess. For the most part, it tries to play as a heavy drama with booming dramatic music. However in moments here and there it thinks it’s a silly comedy. For the most part, the comedy falls flat. Hard. Not only isn’t it funny but it feels cringy to have it in the movie. Jesus (yes, the Jesus) says to his disciples, “one of you Negros is a canary.” The other n-word is also used in the movie in dialog and in the soundtrack. Mary (Alfre Woodard) delivered possibly the movie’s only functional line of humor when she was describing the immaculate conception to Clarence. Paraphrased: “There I was minding my own business, being a virgin…”. Benedict Cumberbatch (how did he end up in this movie?) had one silly line that could have been funny in The Life of Brian but here it was preceded by five minutes of Clarence being whipped while carrying his cross up the hill to be crucified. I would say the comedy missteps prevent the drama from working, but I don’t believe the drama would have worked anyway.
The movie may have tried to have a point but I don’t have any idea what it is. The movie was off-putting, unfunny, and unmoving. I would not recommend this movie to anyone. It’s the first week of January, but this is the movie to beat for “worst movie of the year.”
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