52 Films by Women Vol 6. 40. FATHER STU (Director: Rosalind Ross)
Father Stu is not your typical film by a woman director. It is the passion project of producer-star Mark Wahlberg, who plays the title role and bankrolled the production to the tune of ‘millions and millions’ of dollars. Based on a true story, it is a biopic of the Montana amateur boxer, Stuart Ignatius Long (1963-2014), who became a priest. Wahlberg runs the full gamut of showing he is in great shape at the start of the film in scenes set in the 1980s to being afflicted by a debilitating illness and a prosthetic face in the closing stages. Having failed to interest his first-choice director, David O. Russell, with whom he worked on Three Kings and The Fighter , Wahlberg shopped the project to debutante feature writer-director Rosalind Ross, the partner of Mel Gibson (Gibson played Wahlberg’s dad in the comedy Daddy’s Home 2 ). Ross’ work is proficient. She veers away from one scene that a male director might have embraced, the consummation of the title character’s pursuit of a...