The Apostle **** (1997, Robert Duvall, Todd Allen, Farrah Fawcett) – Classic Movie Review 5401

Writer-director-star Robert Duvall’s 1997 drama is extraordinary, motored by Duvall’s barnstormingly powerful performance as an extremely egotistical religious man, the Texas preacher Euliss ‘Sonny’ Dewey, who sets himself above everything and everybody. His life falls apart after he finds his wife Jessie (Farrah Fawcett) is having an affair with a young minister called Horace (Todd Allen), whom he promptly smashes with a baseball bat.

But then ‘Sonny’ assumes a pseudonym, The Apostle EF, and begins a new life in Louisiana, where he preaches over the radio at the station where he gets a job, soon becoming a local celebrity and embarking on a plan to restore a church.

Duvall’s magnetism is the film, which is a tour-de-force for him as writer-director-star, holding a long movie together commandingly.

Also in the cast are Lenore Banks, John Beasley, Brett Brock and James Gammon.

It is shot by Barry Markowitz, produced by Rob Carliner and scored by David Mansfield.

Duvall was Oscar nominated as Best Actor went on to win the Best Actor Academy Award for Tender Mercies (1983). He has six other Oscar nominations – for The Godfather (1972), Apocalypse Now (1979), The Great Santini (1979, The Apostle, A Civil Action (1998) and The Judge (2014).

© Derek Winnert 2017 Classic Movie Review 5401

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