Apprentice to Murder

A very fine movie, totally underrated. Despite a bad box for the DVD edition, this is NOT a "horror flick", but a greatly interesting and subtle approach of a strange and complex relationship between an influenced young man (Lowe) and a disturbed pow-wow-preacher, tortured by his secret fears -- and desires... Homosexual implications, wonderful camera work, and great musical score by Charles Gross. There is a magic in this movie, which places it somewhere between "The Night of the hunter" and "The Reflecting skin". Felicitations to R.L. Thomas. Oh !... and Donald Sutherland is memorable !... His performance is suave, well balanced, and constantly precise.

An interestingly odd, if not too successful little folktale curio set in Pennsylvania (although it was shot in Norway) in the 1920s as a teenage boy Billy comes under the influence of a backwoods faith healer Dr. Reese who begins to educate him as he becomes drawn to his mystical charms. But Billy finds himself dragged into strange events which end in terrifying results as they believe the local hermit has the motive and power to cause the devastating blight affecting the small village.

Sometimes being unique and incredibly offbeat just doesn't cut it, if it doesn't entirely deliver the goods. I wanted to like "Apprentice to Murder" a lot more than I did, but I felt like it came up short by not completely coming to life with its dangerous predicament. It never really balances its sensationalised mystic concepts, tending to rely on its character relationships (especially the complicated connection between the boy and the faith healer), humdrum dramatic weight and slow- winding story build-up (some episodic filler) where it can have its flat spells. The most fascinating façade I thought was that of the hermit, which comes across very secondary to everything else, but is the main piece that holds everything together. Still its premise is innovative with a lyrical script that for most part engages with its busy themes.

It's low-key in its approach, which is not a problem but it never really delves into the strange happenings and vivid special effects that seem to torture the faith healer. We get the usual supernatural occurrences, that in the end all of this magic might just be that of a disillusion. But this is supposedly inspired by true events involving a pow-pow preacher and his faith in George Hohmann's "Long Lost Friend" that eventually led to murder. The performances stand up very well with Chad Lowe's responsible turn holding his own alongside a charismatically believable Donald Sutherland as the unorthodox faith healer. He does command the screen in a subtle manner emitting somewhat a creepy undertone. The gorgeous Mia Sara doesn't get all that much to do and Eddie Jones also shows up.

Director R. L Thomas does a sensational job presenting strikingly authentic period details, but also the moody score along with the elegant cinematography are instrumental in crafting enticingly symbolic imagery and an effective atmosphere of a god fearing time engulfing rural communities.

If you're planning to watch this simply because you're a Donald Sutherland fan, don't bother. He isn't likely to impress you with his mediocre performance here. As the for the film itself, it's watchable but very minor. It manages to remain reasonably interesting most of the way, but it doesn't have many surprises to offer and it MOVES LIKE MOLASSES!

This film was based loosely on a bizarre murder investigation and subsequent trial in Pennsylvania. At the time, in the 1920s, backwoods Pennsylvania had folk-medicine healers called Pow-Wows, and the film involves one. These healers relied on a book, "Long Lost Friend," written by a George Hohmann, that was full of prayers and folk remedies based on a form of sympathetic magic, that were supposed to cure ailments and the like.

The Sutherland character is a Pow-Wow, and a youngster, played by Lucas Haas, becomes his apprentice. A series of bad events takes place in the community, and the Pow-Wow suspects a neighboring farmer, culminating in the murder.

Significant Spoiler: The film is ambivalent on the nature of the Pow-Wow's power, and leads the viewer in one direction, and then suddenly reverses itself. This weakness could have been sidestepped easily. It would have been a better film if it had.

I love this movie and have recommended it to my students in folk-magic because it is closely based on a true story of murder, mysticism, and (possible) madness concerning a Pennsylvania Dutch Pow Wow doctor in the mid-1920s. Donald Sutherland is superb as John Reese, the highly eccentric conjure and herbalist. Chad Lowe is quite good as his young apprentice. The location shots, filmed in Norway, are spectacular -- not Pennsylvania Dutch country, exactly, but a wonderful rural landscape, with great old 19th century buildings. There is also a very good look at contemporaneous hoodoo practices, as the Pow Wow doctor seeks an outside consultation to cure his ills. If you're a prop and set decoration fan and knowledgeable about magic, look for the couple of Pennsylvania Dutch hex signs (inexplicably called "hexagrams" -- the movie's one false step) that contain Norse bind-runes thrown in on them -- obviously that was the Norwegian prop-maker's little in-joke. This is a great little underrated classic, and the perfect vehicle for Donald Sutherland.