"El Club" had a few main themes, those being religion, irony, secrets and guilt. A lot of viewers have actually said that this film was made to expose the Catholic church and make it look bad. I agree with this statement, because so many events that happened in it were ironic, because there were things done and said by priests (whom this movie focused on) that would not typically qualify as 'holy' in my opinion. El Club is about four old, retired (and at least one gay) Catholic priests living in a house, ("the club") in a secluded, beachy and foggy area in Chile. The house is run by a woman surprisingly, whom is a retired nun, making up all the rules, one being that there was no contact with the outside world unless they were in their circle of religious figures. The group loves racing dogs, which seems to be a shared passion for all of them, (which I thought was a bit strange and random.) They have a strict schedule that forces free time to mold around their duties of praying. However, the reason this house is secluded is because the men are secretly there to ask God to forgive them for their sins, which are actually horrible crimes. These priests are guilty of child molestation, abuse, kidnapping, etc. Early in the movie, a new priest comes into the house, but his sins follow him. A now grown man stands outside the house yelling about the very graphic and horrendous sex abuse he endured as an altar boy from this new priest. However, the priest cannot seemingly stand his guilt, and quickly shoots himself in front of everybody. This is when I realized that this movie is extremely messed up, because later when the police were questioning the others in the house about why he was dead, the nun and other priests lied to cover up the abuse and crimes he had committed. When a new director comes in he sees the dysfunction, and wants to shut down the home. This film then follows the journey of their dog racing, trying to save the home, and the life of the angry man who was abused sexually by the dead priest. I liked this film, but I liked it less and less as it progressed. I found the point of the ending very confusing and it honestly lost me. This was possibly because there was very little dialogue between characters, and when there was, it was short. It ended with men killing the race dogs, blaming it on the man whom was abused and then him being ironically brought to repent his 'sins' in the house with the other four priests. I really loved the beginning, however, and my favorite scene was when the man was outside the home screaming the sex abuse he endured to his molester. I found this very interesting, because not only were the poor man's words very graphic and "unholy" but, as he was yelling them, the priest (his molester) was denying it to his housemates. I thought that when he grabbed the gun he was going to shoot the man yelling outside the house, but actually shot himself, which I was not expecting. I also liked when the nun was cleaning up his blood, she was singing very peaceful church songs. This film was very bizarre, weird and sexual, which I found ironic. I wish that the director had left out the theme of the dog racing because it just confused me and made the main theme of secrecy between priests less prominent and blurry.
Review of The Club
