The Rite Should be Exorcised From Your List of Films to See.
| Tweet | |
The Rite begins as a captivating tale of a young man studying to be a priest and his journey into the sinister world of exorcism, and ends up half humorous, unoriginal and relentlessly dull. And with talent like screen legend Anthony Hopkins and remarkable cinematography in a gothic Roman setting, we expected more.
Horror Queen Says: Bloody Thumbs Down!
Written by BHM Editor Horror Queen
January 28, 2011
Release: January 28, 2011
Directed by: Mikael Hafstrom
Written by: Michael Petroni, Matt Baglio (book)
Starring:
Anthony Hopkins as Father Lucas Trevant
Colin O’Donoghue as Michael Kovak
Alice Braga as Angeline
Ciaran Hinds as Father Xavier
Rutger Hauer as Istvan Kovak
Raised in faith by his mortician father (played aptly but not to the degree of his talent by Rutger Hauer), Michael is a young man fraught with questioning that faith and in fact his entire future. Will he follow in his father’s morbid footsteps, or will he dedicate his life to serving the God he’s not sure exists? After much thought and a few years in seminary school, Michael decides his lack of faith is not going anywhere. Does he find another career? No, he instead embarks on a trip to Rome to attend one of the Vatican’s hip new classes on exorcising demons in today’s world. Go figure.
As you can guess, Michael arrives in Rome doubting the validity of exorcism which leads him to the ‘unorthodox’ but
very client-heavy Father Lucas (played aptly but not to the degree of his talent by Anthony Hopkins). With the young recruit under his wing, Father Lucas performs the exorcism of a sixteen year old pregnant girl in front of him on the first day of his mentorship.
For me this is where the intrigue stops and the anticlimax begins. Father Lucas taking a break to answer his cell phone in the middle of the exorcism drew puzzled laughs from an otherwise entranced audience. This began a roller coaster ride of inappropriate ‘comic relief’ in a film touted as being truly frightening and ‘based on true events’. Sure, Hopkins had his funny moments in Silence of the Lambs (‘I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti’) but his one-liners in The Rite are misplaced, overdone and eventually take us out of the game.
This is not to say there aren’t nail-biting scenes in The Rite, there are. The possession of teenage Angeline for instance, is very well played by the compelling Alice Braga, and there are certainly the standard jolts we’re used to in horror films including Director Mikael Hafstrom’s former film 1408. Similar to that film tough, too much fast-paced, hurried action in the final act can also be anticlimactic. By the end of the The Rite, we’re not sure if we’ve seen a supernatural thriller or a one-man stand up act by a legendary performer forced into a poorly written role.
The choice of Colin O’Donahue for the lead role of Michael is an interesting one. A little known Irish actor, he proves to be as one dimensional as the film itself.
If you’re purely a Hopkins fan, see the The Rite. He’s larger than life. But if you’re looking for a film about demonic possession that isn’t relentlessly dull and hasn’t been done a hundred times, exorcise this one from your list of films to see.
Questions or comments about the Rite? Discuss it on The Ossuary Forums!
Take me to Horror Movie Reviews!
Horror Movie Freaks is the FREE eZine from Best-Horror-Movies.com that will give you the new horror releases, the new horror news and the new horror reviews that you CANNOT LIVE WITHOUT!!
Subscribing is easy, painless and free.
Do it NOW!!
