Dean Spanley

A quirky tale of reconciliation through reincarnation, DEAN SPANLEY features an extravagant performance by Peter O'Toole. The veteran actor plays an exceedingly cranky, elderly Edwardian father named Fisk– the sort of gentleman who is insulted at the suggestion that anything in his ordered life should ever change. His put-upon housekeeper must cook him the same meal on the same day each week, and every Thursday his dutiful and frustrated son Fisk Junior pops by to take him out somewhere he might find amusing. One Thursday, father and son make their way to the grand home of a swami who is giving a lecture on the transmigration of souls. The Fisks consider it hogwash but encounter an interesting character at the lecture, an eccentric local priest named Dean Spanley (Sam Neil), who turns out to be open-minded enough to find the idea of reincarnation feasible. Intrigued by the clergyman, Fisk Junior invites him to dinner. When Dean Spanley begins, over glasses of exquisite Hungarian Tokay wine, to recount tales of his former life as a dog, even irascible Fisk Senior takes interest. A beautiful, literary, and intelligent film based on a 1936 novel. –B.B.