Metacritic reviews

Carrera's direct, unadorned style has none of the searing imagery or cinematic imagination of "Y Tu Mama," but it bristles with passion, anger and a palpable sense of betrayal.

May be morally tangled, pessimistic, lurid and foreboding, but it's also humanistic.

Commendably, Carrera steers clear of preachiness in his exploration of a timely and relevant issue, and Bernal's transformation from naive priest to tortured adulterer to hard-nosed careerist is riveting.

Not an indictment of the Catholic Church as a whole, but a thought-provoking look at what can happen when decent individuals are seduced by the power of their position.

Carrera directs with a light touch, letting the screenplay speak for itself.

Carrera's handsome film offers a richly detailed portrait of a church not so much corrupt as morally lazy after centuries in command of an overwhelmingly Catholic country.

Would have been better served if Carrera had spent a little more energy developing his story and less on emphasizing his message.

Carrera's style is hard-hitting, lucid and technically superior (if unimaginative). El Crimen del Padre Amaro eventually moves and stirs you, even if it often resembles those steamy Mexican TV dramas/soap operas called telenovelas.

However much the film may mirror the truth, dramatically it feels like a cheat. It omits the human spark that would make it work as a film, rather than a collection of dramatized issues.

Father Amaro comes off as another pedophile in a frock. You'd have to hose this guy down if he were driving a school bus.