MOVIE NEWS – Kiefer Sutherland puts on the priestly robes, a sweeping black coat and a cappello romano to wage war on New York crime in Luc Besson’s new action thriller Father Joe, and the first Venice reviews range from delighted disbelief to outright frustration. TheWrap has already dubbed him “Catholic Batman,” while Al Pacino plays the mob boss standing in his way, resulting in something that seems to exist somewhere between John Wick, a religious morality play and an unapologetically bizarre B-movie.

The 2026 Venice Film Festival may be hosting plenty of heavyweight awards contenders, but one of its strangest attractions is unquestionably Father Joe. Luc Besson, the filmmaker behind Léon: The Professional and The Fifth Element, wrote the screenplay, with Barthélémy Grossmann directing the 1990s-set New York crime story. Kiefer Sutherland stars as Father Joe, a Catholic priest who tends to his flock by day and turns vigilante after dark. TheWrap’s description of him as “Catholic Batman” sounds exaggerated until the details of his extracurricular activities start piling up.

Joe patrols the city in a flowing black coat and traditional Roman clerical hat, targeting drug dealers who sell to people under 21. Killing them is apparently one option; forced rehabilitation is another. Some offenders are injected with poison and told they will receive the antidote only if they attend Mass. The method becomes considerably more complicated when Joe applies his unconventional theology to Gio Falcone, a powerful mob boss played by Al Pacino. On paper, the entire premise borders on parody, yet one of the recurring observations in the early reviews is that Sutherland refuses to treat any of it as a joke.

Screen Daily’s Tim Grierson argues that this absolute seriousness is exactly what keeps the character from collapsing under the weight of his contradictions. Sutherland gives Joe genuine calm and spiritual conviction even as the priest dispatches criminals with the kind of ruthless efficiency associated with superheroes or John Wick. Because the actor never signals to the audience that he is above the material, Joe’s faith in human goodness and his willingness to commit murder somehow emerge from the same believable core. TheWrap’s Siddhant Adlakha makes essentially the same point in fewer words, praising Sutherland’s complete commitment to such an outrageous premise.

Pacino, surprisingly, appears to be playing things much more quietly. Deadline’s Damon Wise found him to be one of the only elements in the movie that does not constantly push toward excess, with the veteran star willingly surrendering the spotlight to Sutherland in a role that can be entertaining, ridiculous and unexpectedly funny at the same time. The Upcoming’s Selina Sondermann came away with the opposite impression, arguing that the 86-year-old screen legend seems disengaged and lacks the familiar electricity audiences associate with his best work.

Ever Anderson also stars as Felicity, a teenager who becomes involved in Father Joe’s crusade against the criminal underworld. Reviewers have already pointed out her striking resemblance to her mother, Milla Jovovich, whose history with Besson stretches back through some of the filmmaker’s most recognizable work. A dangerous older protector paired with a young woman naturally invites comparisons to Léon: The Professional, although Father Joe pushes that dynamic through a very different mixture of Catholic iconography, mob violence and comic-book vigilantism.

Besson’s work has often walked a precarious line between sincerity and deliberate excess, and the early response suggests Father Joe may be especially unstable on that front. Marshall Shaffer of The Playlist warns that viewers expecting the pulpy setup to evolve into knowingly campy madness could be disappointed because Sutherland approaches Joe with the same stern conviction he once brought to Jack Bauer in 24. Shaffer describes the movie as simultaneously overcrowded and strangely underdeveloped, caught somewhere between an overextended television pilot and a feature film that has had too much connective tissue stripped away.

The production itself is inspiring similarly contradictory reactions. The Playlist criticizes visuals that can look distractingly cheap, including period details that fail to convincingly sell 1990s Manhattan, while TheWrap also believes the limited budget frequently shows and argues that the action suffers from sluggish editing. Screen Daily sees virtually the opposite movie, praising the action for its urgency and finding the production values impressive given what appears to have been a relatively tight budget. Even one of the harsher assessments concedes that the ending manages to become unexpectedly moving despite everything that precedes it.

That divide may ultimately be the most useful indication of what Father Joe actually is. For some viewers, Kiefer Sutherland playing a deadly priest who poisons dealers into going to church while facing Al Pacino’s mob boss may be irresistible genre lunacy; for others, the movie’s refusal to laugh at itself could make the whole exercise collapse. Either way, the first Venice reactions suggest Sutherland commits to his priestly John Wick with enough conviction to give the film a personality of its own. Deadline perhaps offered the most fitting verdict imaginable for something this peculiar: “Is it any good? Who knows.”

Source: MovieWeb