Luther

(Guy Green, 1974)
This is one of those movies where the camera pivots at scene's end to a guy in a helmet who stares straight at you and spells out what's going on. This kind of alienation has nothing to do with Brecht - the whole stagebound ordeal lies frozen like a bug in amber, and while the camera pokes around despondently the quite estimable actors are often reduced to declaiming over its shoulder. Stacy Keach's monastery freak-out provides the only burst of energy, and what scant wit remains gets swallowed up by the Protestant history lesson, skipping from one Important Event to the next like a textbook. Godless cad that I am, I expect some razzle-dazzle with my theology.