Written by Michael Petroni and Evan Spiliotopoulos. Directed by Julius Avery. Running time 103 minutes.
Based on An Exorcist Tells His Story and An Exorcist: More Stories by Gabriele Amorth. This tell the 'true' story of Gabriele Amorth an actual Catholic priest who claimed to have performed over 160,000 exorcisms over his lifetime.
In this film, set in the 1980s, the first in an obviously hoped for new franchise starring everyone's favourite Australian actor who's not Hugh Jackson - Russell Crowe, Crowe plays the rugged real life exorcist, Gabriele Amorth. Crowe was picked because of his uncanny resemblance to the real life Amorth, seen here.
See, uncanny.
ANYWAY, he's the Pope's own personal Sexorcist and he's got a mandate from the big boss man to perform exorcisms whenever he wants, regardless what his Catholic bosses say about there not being a need for exorcisms anymore.
When an attractive American MILF widow and her two children, one a mute boy who looks odd and the other her overly sexually precocious teenage daughter move into a disused nunnery in Spain you just know the shit's going to hit the fan, the daughters going to end up crawling upside-down from the ceiling like a spider and the boggle-eyed mute boy's going to end up possessed and guess what, he does and she does! But why and what's this got to do with Gabe and the nunnery and why is there a Papal seal on old nunnery's well?
Well get ready for a classic battle between actual good and evil as loveable old priest Gabe does battle with a demon while playing a game of The Exorcist: Movie Cliche Bingo! Yes, that's right! using that vastly superior and actually terrifying classic movie as its very own playbook, The Pope's SexExorocist wastes no time at all in plundering the 1973 Oscar nominated movie for all it's tropes and beats, obviously assuming that today's audiences won't be aware of a film as old as most modern cinema audiences goer's parents.
Uncovering a conspiracy over 200 years old, Gabe discovers the nunnery is built on a site where God can't go and that it's just one of 200 similar sites around the world and in doing so, establishes the basis for the franchise that everyone involved with the making of the film is eager for the general public to take up so they can make more of these.
ANYWAY, he's the Pope's own personal Sexorcist and he's got a mandate from the big boss man to perform exorcisms whenever he wants, regardless what his Catholic bosses say about there not being a need for exorcisms anymore.
When an attractive American MILF widow and her two children, one a mute boy who looks odd and the other her overly sexually precocious teenage daughter move into a disused nunnery in Spain you just know the shit's going to hit the fan, the daughters going to end up crawling upside-down from the ceiling like a spider and the boggle-eyed mute boy's going to end up possessed and guess what, he does and she does! But why and what's this got to do with Gabe and the nunnery and why is there a Papal seal on old nunnery's well?
Well get ready for a classic battle between actual good and evil as loveable old priest Gabe does battle with a demon while playing a game of The Exorcist: Movie Cliche Bingo! Yes, that's right! using that vastly superior and actually terrifying classic movie as its very own playbook, The Pope's SexExorocist wastes no time at all in plundering the 1973 Oscar nominated movie for all it's tropes and beats, obviously assuming that today's audiences won't be aware of a film as old as most modern cinema audiences goer's parents.
Uncovering a conspiracy over 200 years old, Gabe discovers the nunnery is built on a site where God can't go and that it's just one of 200 similar sites around the world and in doing so, establishes the basis for the franchise that everyone involved with the making of the film is eager for the general public to take up so they can make more of these.
Russell Crowe could have sleep walked this role, and yet he's inoffensive in it, the film isn't scary, but it's entertaining and the action is satisfying. It's helped in no small part by the always excellent Franco Nero as Da Pope, who even when he's suffering the after-effects of a massive heart attack and lying in a hospital ICU bed still manages to fight off evil attack.
It's a hoot and a half and doesn't outstay its welcome, plus it's not big or clever and it's just over an hour and a half in length. There's worst things to see at the cinema than this, like Shazam, which I've not even seen!
6/10
It's a hoot and a half and doesn't outstay its welcome, plus it's not big or clever and it's just over an hour and a half in length. There's worst things to see at the cinema than this, like Shazam, which I've not even seen!
6/10
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