Benno Furmann

Poldek (Wirckiewicz) works in the Lvov sewers with his young sidekick Szczepek (Skonieczny). When the Nazis begin to systematically clear out the Jewish ghetto, either murdering them or shipping them off to the camps, a handful of Jews escape into the sewers, where Poldek and Szczepek agree to help them for a price. But as the months go on, Poldek becomes increasingly involved in their lives, causing stress with his wife (Preis) back home and making him very nervous around his soldier pal Bortnik (Zurawski).

Continue reading: In Darkness Review

The Catholic church has been a source of inspiration for a whole slew of scary movies -- everything from goosepimpling tales of possession like "The Exorcist" to fact-based stories of institutionalized horror like the current art-house hit "The Magdalene Sisters."

But mostly these scary movies have not been all that frightening. In fact, mostly they've been forgettably cheap-fright thrillers that make up their own mythology, then dress it up in cassocks and clerical collars for mock-credibility, much like "The Order."

This dark supernatural thriller about a brooding young man of the cloth (lumpy-featured heartthrob Heath Ledger) in the midst of a major crisis of faith (there's this girl, see...) is loosely based on an archaic con offered to ex-communicated sinners on their deathbeds in Medieval times: Someone calling himself a "sin eater" would perform a ceremony in which, for a price, he would assume all the dying person's transgressions and guilt so he or she would be free to enter Heaven.

Continue reading: The Order Review