The Book of Clarence

The Book of Clarence isn’t quite what you may expect with this subject matter and with LaKeith Stansfield in the title role.

Of course, directors are usually those who have a set ‘style’ and actors are largely known for their versatility (indeed, Stansfield has performed brilliantly within lots of genres) but, given the film’s marketing and his predilection for particularly prescient, intelligent and insightful projects like Get Out, Sorry to Bother You, Judas and the Black Messiah and Atlanta, it’s a surprise that the film isn’t more of a ‘statement.’

Ostensibly, we follow the titular Clarence, a non-religious man living in Jerusalem at the same time as Jesus.

Seeing the exploits of the self-proclaimed Son of God, Clarence emulates his journey and finds a lot of the same events happening to him.

There’s scope here for a truly pointed, sharp and incisive film and at times it does allude to that.

A lot of Clarence’s sermons and statements about ‘knowledge over belief,’ and his eventual acceptance of all people and forgiveness, are thought-provoking and delivered brilliantly by Stansfield and a stacked cast with some excellent cameos (a hilarious turn by Benedict Cumberbatch being one of the highlights.)

However, quite a large chunk of the rest of the film comes over as a lesser Monty Python and, sometimes, goes down the path of a noughties stoner comedy.

There’s nothing necessarily wrong with this but not all of the jokes land, some sequences seem overly long and ponderous and, tonally, it just feels a little all over the place.

The ending also leaves a little to be desired. There’s no problem with things being open to interpretation but any message that the film had previously been trying to deliver (some of it with a distinctly ‘anti-religious’ tone) then gets totally steamrolled.

A strange film in more ways than one and an unfortunate disappointment given what this maybe could have been.

However, it’s still an enjoyable and thoughtful comedy with some interesting things to say.

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