Ethan Hawke is usually interesting as an actor, but I came to this film because of the soundtrack. The soundtrack is by one of my favorite electronic music artists, and I couldn't imagine his music being used in a film.
It almost isn't. There are only a couple of scenes, dream sequences mainly, where the eerie electronic music underpins the scene. The rest of the move is music-free. The soundtrack album contains 10x more music than the film (and it is great).
The film is a "transcendental piece" by Paul Schrader (his term). Hawke plays a priest who has his faith rocked by the suicide of a parishioner, and struggles to find another center to his life. At the same time, he's struggling with what is probably cancer and treating it with too much alcohol, so he's faced with considerable irony trying to counsel others.
It's a slow, grim, nihilistic piece, beautifully shot and acted -- but probably only rates 3 stars out of 10 because ultimately it wallows rather than enlightens.
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