Priest

Greg, a young priest assigned to a parish in Liverpool, conceals his own homosexuality and discovers that his senior colleague is quietly involved with the housekeeper. Then, in confession, a girl tells him her father is abusing her, and the seal of the confessional prevents him from speaking. Antonia Bird ties the two lines together: how an institution's own rules paralyse the people inside it. The film drew hard reaction from Catholic organisations and met protests in the United States. Linus Roache plays it without any defensiveness. It won the audience award at Berlin. The final mass is where the argument gathers. Who it is for: viewers who like British social drama and films about the tension between faith and the individual. Who it is not for: anyone avoiding the subject of abuse.