Monk Dawson

Based on a Piers Paul Read novel about a defrocked monk's progress along the Via Dolorosa of trendy '70s Cheyne Walk, this sets up high expectations it's unable to satisfy. Michie's portrayal of the idealistic Benedictine Eddie Dawson is technically proficient, expressing well the man's vulnerability and angry, hurt consternation when he's expelled from the order for sheltering an unmarried mother. But as Dawson throws himself into the self-seeking cauldron of London society, reduced to hack journalism for a venal tabloid supremo (Kemp) in order to support an unwise marriage, Michie can't find the depth required to make palpable the complex feelings of alienation Dawson experiences, as he drowns in a sea of betrayal, broken ideals and misplaced affection. There's little at fault in the screenplay, and the cinematography lights the bleak Northumberland moors as effectively as the restaurants and houses of London SW3. But as a moral 'entertainment', the film has no enlightening core.