Film Critic Dismisses Death, Torture of Mexican Catholics

Film critics have been brutal to the new film “For Greater Glory.”

It’s hard to find a review where the movie’s violence isn’t spotlighted – and trashed – even though modern movies routinely dole out far more destructive sequences than depicted in “Glory.”

Simply said, faith-based films endure greater scrutiny from movie critics who generally lean left.

But Detroit News film critic Tom Long isn’t just critical of the film. Long dismisses the real-life tragedies reflected in the story.

“For Greater Glory” recalls the Cristero War, a battle between Mexican Catholics and the government over religious freedom. The government didn’t simply block public displays of faith during the 1920s. It killed priests and other spiritually-minded people who refused to obey the law.Here’s how Long depicts these harrowing elements captured in the film, courtesy of Newsbusters:

Apparently in the 1920s, the Mexican government went on some sort of rampage against Catholics. Priests were shot, churches shuttered, that kind of thing. 

Not surprisingly, since the entire country pretty much converted to Catholicism, a rebel force arose to fight for the right to be Catholic. In the film, an atheist general (Andy Garcia) agrees to lead the rebels because he believes in religious freedom. 

And then lots of people get killed. Priests, children, endless soldiers shooting one another. Director Dean Wright has obviously been charged with creating a Historic Epic here, with all the fuss and overkill that requires.

He succeeds in making enough noise, but what the noise is about is left pretty unclear. Why was the Mexican government, personified by Ruben Blades as President Plutarco Elias Calles, intent on secularizing Mexico? And why do we care?”

We’re stumped, too.

After all, if a government denies its people the basic right to worship as they please, that’s none of our business. Move along … nothing to see here, folks.

It’s one thing to over-analyze a film because it doesn’t fit your narrow world view. It’s another to downplay atrocities and describe people being shot as “that kind of thing.”

And here’s the kicker Newsbusters left out of Long’s review:

But the result is pretty much as forgettable as the Cristeros War.

Roughly 90,000 people died in the Cristero War, a travesty Mexican history books do their best to cover up. Or, as Long calls it, the “forgettable” war.