The Saint (1997)

The Saint is a 1997 espionage thriller film, starring Val Kilmer in the title role, with Elisabeth Shue and Rade Šerbedžija, directed by Phillip Noyce and written by Jonathan Hensleigh and Wesley Strick. The title character is a high tech thief and master of disguise that becomes the anti-hero while using the moniker of various saints while paradoxically living in the underworld of international industrial theft. The film was a financial success with a worldwide box office of $169.4 million, rentals of $28.2 million, and continuous DVD sales.

It is loosely based on the character of Simon Templar created by Leslie Charteris in 1928 for a series of books published as "The Saint", which ran until 1983. The Saint character has also featured in a series of Hollywood movies made between 1938 and 1954, a 1940s radio series starring Vincent Price (and others) as Templar, a popular British television series of the 1960s which starred Roger Moore, and a 1970s series starring Ian Ogilvy.

Synopsis

At the Saint Ignatius Orphanage, a rebellious boy named John Rossi refers to himself as "Simon Templar" and leads a group of fellow orphans as they attempt to run away to escape their harsh treatment. When Simon is caught by the head priest, he witnesses the tragic death of a girl he had taken a liking to when she accidentally falls from a balcony.

Actors