Review of The Name of the Rose (1986) by Alexandro O — 24 Apr 2011

Superbly-creepy and grim whodunnit with horror under-pinnings set in an enormous 14th century Italian haunted-house-esque Abbey poulated by a menagerie of monstrously-maniacal monks, each uglier than the last.

Sean Connery is at his most enjoyably- hammy as Franciscan friar/armchair super-sleuth William of Baskerville, called in to solve the various murders by the chunky Abbot (Michael Lonsdale). Along for the ride is Christian Slater in an early performance (And thankfully before he started needlessly channelling Jack Nicholson-) as naive novice monk Adso of Melk--kind of the Dr.

Watson to Connery's medieval Sherlock Holmes. Very talky, at times overlong, with meandering plot-twists and red-herrings aplenty, but well worth the experience, as the acting is uniformly marvelous, and the hideous characters will make you feel you're attending an old-fashioned carnival freak-show.

The fiendishly-funky friars are essayed by an impressive and offbeat international cast, with Elya Baskin (As the goofy apothecary Severinus-), Feodor Chaliapin, Jr. (Essaying ancient, blind, and wraith-like Jorge de Burgos-), Michael Habeck (As the enormously-rotund and effeminate Brother Berengar-), raspy William Hickey (As withered mummy-like Ubertino de Casale ), Helmut Qualtinger (As corpulent-and-horny glutton Remigio De Varagine-), and vulture-like Volker Prechtel (As secretive & sociopathic librarian Brother Malachia-) rounding out the gallery of gloriously-grotesque gargoyles.

Also of note are Valentina Vargas as an unrealistically beautiful & super-model-like peasant girl who becomes embroiled in the unpleasant-and-unseemly goings-on, F. Murray Abraham as bloodthirsty Inquisitor Bernardo Gui, and Ron Perlman as the brutish and demented hunchback Salvatore.

A supremely different and intriguing murder mystery, not easily forgotten.