Paul McGann plays Father Lorenzo Rojas, a Spanish monk who falls from grace when novice Juan reveals to him that 'he' is actually a woman, Matilda (Sophie Ward); she has been posing as a man so that she can be close to Lorenzo, the object of her affection. Unable to resist temptation, Lorenzo begins a clandestine love affair with Matilda, but his attention eventually wanders to young beauty Angela, which leads to his downfall...
In my review for El monje (1972), I wrote that the film was good, but could have benefitted from being more daring given its lurid subject matter: sex, violence, rape, murder, religion and general deviancy. This 1990 version of the same story (based on the 18th century Gothic novel The Monk: A Romance by Matthew Gregory Lewis) had the opportunity to be more explicit, but also feels frustratingly reserved, the film never quite as shocking as the plot demands.
The performances are fine, with McGann putting in a solid turn as the weak-willed and easily corrupted Lorenzo, and Ward is suitably mischievous as the gender-bending Matilda, who turns to Satan in order to fulfil her wishes. Director Francisco Lara Polop handles the material well enough, but his failure to push boundaries results in another less than completely satisfactory adaptation. A third adaptation of the novel was filmed in 2011, starring Vincent Cassel; I haven't seen that one yet, but from what I have read, it doesn't do the novel justice either.
6.5/10, rounded up to 7 for IMDb.
