Whatever your views on organized religion in general, or corruption and abuse within the Catholic Church in particular, in terms of keeping up the audience's "wow-I-can't-believe-this-is-happening" level of interest, El Crimen del Padre Amaro is one of the most relentlessly eye-opening dramas of the year. From its opening bus hijacking, during which the movie's young "hero," a newly sanctified priest on his way to his first parrish assignment, demonstrates his virtue by handing over a cache of cash to an indigent old man, to its bitterly ironic ending, Carlos Carrera's movie is fantastic cinematic storytelling. Its box-office take in the land of its origin has rendered this film Mexico's equivalent of Titanic. But this box-office blockbuster is no big-budget, effects laden romantic period epic. (In fact, while it's based on a 19th century novel, its events have been updated to the present day.) No, this is a feverishly eventful but understatedly portrayed drama that does, in fact, take sharp aim at that country's Catholic Church. No sooner does the title priest (played by the boyishly appealing but very accomplished Bernal, whose turns in this, Amores Perros and Y Tu Mama Tambien suggest he could be Mexico's answer to Leonardo Di Caprio) arrive at his parrish than he's tempted by a young nubile whose mom happens to be, ahem, servicing his supervisor. And that's just the tip of the — shall we say iceberg? — here. Is this controversial film anti-Catholic? Well, it stops just short of saying that the only good priest is a renegade priest, one who ends up excommunicated at that. So, let the devout beware.