Mark Wahlberg

Had the Mark Wahlberg vehicle Flight Risk, which topped the US box office last weekend with a modest but far from disastrous $12 million gross, been directed by most competent journeymen filmmakers, then it would have been a case of job done, box ticked and onto the next project. If you were told, however, that it was made by an Oscar-winning filmmaker whose previous movies have been large-scale dramatic epics — and who, frankly, would have done a far more interesting job with The Brutalist, although its overtly Jewish themes may have given him considerable difficulty — then the first question most people would ask is “Why?” And then when you’re told the director in question is Mel Gibson, the response is usually “Ah” and “Oh.

Later this week, probably the world’s greatest living film director will celebrate his eightieth birthday. However he celebrates — whether in the company of friends and family in his no doubt opulent Manhattan home, or working on his eagerly awaited new film Killers of the Flower Moon — Martin Scorsese can reach his milestone age in the confidence that his position in cinematic history is assured forever. For a man so steeped in the art and practice of filmmaking — and who has made several excellent documentaries about movies — it must be intensely gratifying for Scorsese to be aware that he is that rarest of persons, a living legend, whose contributions to film will live forever.

Father Stu opened in theaters this Holy Week. It’s a movie about a real-life man who led a depraved and reckless life, found God, became a priest, suffered greatly and died from an incurable disease. And did so — more importantly — with patience and good nature that inspired multitudes of those around him. The film’s message is essentially that suffering has value, and as we sit in the richest nation in history drowning in the highest levels of depression ever recorded, such a reminder could not come at a better time. It’s a curious thing that so many people are dissatisfied with life when the standard of living has never been higher.