a monk. and the balance between virtue and sin. a medieval story. and the realities of each century. it is not easy to use, in right manner, a delicate theme like this. but The Monk is a decent example and its basic virtue is the performance of Vincent Cassel who gives to the father Ambrosio the right portrait of fight against temptations and who has its fail as result of the need to be yourself. a film about solitude and mission, it is one of films who preserves the flavor of a fascinating period , talking, with delicacy, about ours. and this fact does the film interesting. seductive. strange. because it is only the chronicle of an war who has the virtue to be not only the war against himself of a man of Church. it is a film about choices. who are more than choices of a monk. and, more important, it is a bridge to a manner to discover and assume reality who could not be reduced at a sketch of a past page from history.