Stella Days

Although Martin Sheen often goes full cherub in his depiction of the film's central Catholic priest, the pictue is also a frank assessment of a cleric's crisis of faith and the church's rather ruthless efforts to maintain medieval control in the face of modernization.

Thanks to its understated elegance and surpassing central performance, this modest, too-eagerly schematic period drama is more engrossing than it has a right to be.

Playing an emotionally burdened small-town Catholic priest in culturally isolated 1950s Ireland, Martin Sheen does his best work since "The West Wing" in Thaddeus O'Sullivan's Stella Days.

Stella Days' strongest asset is Sheen.

Relaxed performances and pillow-soft photography compensate somewhat for the story's narrow ambitions, but they're not enough to invigorate a movie that clearly would rather charm than challenge.

Sheen's throwback portrayal is appealing enough, but flat characters, dull revelations and uninvolving complications make this deliberately small film feel nearly microscopic.