The Devil and Father Amorth

The Exorcist is still considered (rightfully) as one of the best horror movies of all time. This documentary goes beyond that, with the original director giving us some insights. Where the story originated, original shooting location, chracters versus their real life inspired ... humans/demons.

All that is well and good, but unfortunately even with a short running time, it does feel long at times. Especially during the "real" exorcism. It's nice to get a behind the scenes look, but it doesn't add anything to the discussion really. Although I can see that some may feel it has more weight, because it is "real". Why do I use "" when I write real? Because even the documentary, tries to pick it apart, with experts (doctors) and priests talking about it.

And even their arguments and their insight is nothing really new, at least not that much new things. I like Friedkin, he is a great director, so he does get the most of certain situations (though his insistance on asking the same question over and over again to a priest, about his spiritual "power" does feel a bit long and annoying), overall the documentary could have been shorter though. I do hope he makes more feature films - they tend to be really great

I like how it was documentary style. I also liked that they showed both sides of the argument. Her voice when she was possessed sounded like the nazi zombies from call of duty. The ending was a bit ridiculous

The Devil and Father Amorth (2017)

** (out of 4)

For better or worse, THE EXORCIST will always be the film people think of whenever William Friedkin is discussed. I personally don't think it's his best film but there's no question that it was a ground-breaking motion picture that was the director's most successful at the box office. It's interesting to see that towards the end of his career he would revisit the subject of exorcisms but this time it's the true story of Father Amorth who let Friedkin film his ninth exorcism on a woman.

THE DEVIL AND FATHER AMORTH got released to mostly negative reviews with many calling into question the ethics of Friedkin because of a twist that happens towards the end of the picture. I'll get to that more in a minute but there's no doubt that this here is a rather questionable movie for the director to tackle and especially when you consider it's just 69-minutes, which makes it feel more like a Blu-ray extra instead of an actual feature. In fact, Friedkin hasn't taken too kindly to the negative press this film has gotten and has really lashed out at critics.

Well, I'm sorry to say it but I have to agree with the negativity surrounding this picture. The first ten or so minutes basically has Friedkin talking about THE EXORCIST including revisiting the locations where it was filmed. He talks about the case that the movie was based on and then we get some archival footage of William Peter Blatty discussing the original case and the film. Umm... okay. I'm really not sure why we needed this stuff unless it was some sort of attempt to bring more attention to this movie. Perhaps the running time wasn't long enough so this was added?

Whatever the case is, none of this early footage is of much interest but then we jump to the exorcism that is being performed. We hear from the woman's family as well as Father Amorth who talks about exorcisms and various ones that he has performed. Once we get to the exorcism the main thing that's going to jump out is the voice coming from the woman. Some have question whether it's a sound effect or not but I really don't know. Are these scenes scary? Not at all.

What follows is Friedkin talking to a various of doctors and showing them the footage. There's a debate on whether it is some sort of brain issue yet we never really get any test results from the woman herself. The back and forth debate on the religious issue to the medical one is rather interesting but then we get back to the controversial ending. I'm not going to spoil it for people but I must admit that I found it to be incredibly stupid and I didn't buy it at all. It's like one of those monster hunter television shows where nothing ever happens until the moment a camera isn't set up.

THE DEVIL AND FATHER AMORTH is a film that I was really looking forward to but it's a real shame that it turned out the way it did.

The recorded exorcism itself is very interesting, yet also kind of boring. I liked hearing interpretations of the psychiatrists and neuroscientists and the archbishop. The priest himself and the "possessed" woman's family members (as well as the other interview subjects who said they'd previously been possessed and freed) were less reliable sources since they had so much emotional investment, religious fervor and fear, and strict viewpoints that it didn't really leave anything open for discussion. The movie opens with the stat that 500,000 Italians a year seek out exorcism. That's a lot of people who believe they have the devil inside them, but it's also worth noting that about 75% of the country is Catholic. In other words, an exceptionally religious country is also exceptionally "possessed" ... or it might be more accurate to say that they are afraid they are possessed and more likely seek out spiritual solutions for their problems.

For the end sequence, the director resorted to a recap of a final event using creepy narration, "scary" stock footage, dark music, and stingers to try to create a scary scene, but the whole time I was just wondering why he didn't record it (since that's the whole reason he was there) while also feeling like I couldn't really take his word after watching the footage of the actual exorcism and it being nothing like this final "terrifying" event he later describes but doesn't let us view.

Bottom line. The "possessed" woman was definitely in distress, but the unanswered question is: What is the root of her distress and what is the solution? Very interesting topic, okay execution. How you feel about it will partially depend on how you feel about possession going into it.

It's interesting to see people giving this a one star rating based on their own personal belief. It's really nice if you're an atheist or Christian but setting that aside it's a competent documentary. Seemed pretty open minded to me. Friedkin's stand point seemed to be he felt there was something to it but wasn't 100% convinced. The music was a bit intrusive and framing during a couple of his monologues seemed careless. I don't know or care if extra processing was done on her voice. Other than those things it was interesting and helmed by an intelligent, rational guy. Giving it a 1 or even a 10 seems like a personal issue with the religious aspect rather than standing back and viewing objectively.