The Exorcism of God

I did like this movie, despite all the criticism.

The story was good, good acting on the main characters and good make up an cgi.

It took all thats good in other "possession" movies and put it to good use.

If you check my other reviews I go back a number of years and no one owns me, this is a real review by a horror fan.

The 10's are likely fakes. Movie is not a 10. Its not a 0 either. And better than average.

Every time I see an exorcism movie advertised I roll my eyes. I am 54, and have seen them all from the Exorcist own down. I often pass by the long stairs in Georgetown where the priest in that movie appeared and death happened.

But. This movie brings several fresh things to the table. I won't spoil any, better if you see them with no clue. Know that they are very original and never seen before. My teenage girls and wife were screaming often, and they do not scare easy. They are seasoned horror fans.

If you are a fan of horror, if you like to be scared, if you like earned jump scares, this is for you. The acting is really really good, the special effects are also well done. There is a lot of heart and they have done the max with the budget they had. If you are a horror fan, you will be fine.

There are some sexual topics in the movie that may not be suitable for younger viewers. It is rated R for a reason. Mainly the sexual aspects. All told, the sum total of all scenes with sexual tones are less than 10 minutes. It is not over used. But it is there, including some explicit language. Personally, I would say for teens ages 15 and up. The more up the better. My teenage daughters made ME close my eyes twice. Seriously.

The plot has not been done before, that is new too. One of the types of exorcism has NEVER been done before in any movie, ever. Was a fun twist.

Hopefully there will be a part 2. Movie alludes to it, but no worries, the movie stands on its own.

Enjoy.

Exorcist movies never seem to quite wane. I suppose people in general are suckers for Good vs Evil - Bible style. Unfortunately screenwriters and directors are suckers for making bad exorcist movies.

Personally I am a sucker for exorcist movies, but I try to give a nuanced review....

Plot: tainted priest defies advice and tries to exorcize victim on his own which makes him vulnerable in ways he would never fathom.

The production company has managed to get a substantial number of investors interested in getting this movie done. Rightly so. I was pleasantly surprised by the acting and the special effects. Some reviewers complain about the quality, unjustly so. But I suppose if you decide to monitor the effects you may see some flaws, but I you focus on the movie as a whole, they hold up just fine. I have seen much worse mistakes, i.e. Mircophone in the jungle in Schwarzenegger's Predator and a fully visible tech guy in X-tro.

This exorcist movie has some new takes on the genre, such a reversed ecxorcism as well as new thoughts about the ritual of exocrcisms. There is also some semi new stuff as seen in the excellent series Evil and The Exorcist, which makes it more intersting and potent. However, the downside of this potency is that the movie is a bit too short to fit all this in. I think this movie would have improved by downplaying the occult elements the first 30-40 minutes and focused more on creating a mystery. The origin of some of the possessed "creatures" is somewhat unclear.

On the whole this is a solid movie on par with recent movies like Aaron Eckhart's Incarnate, Eric Bana's Deliver us from Evil, but substantially beneath the classic The Exorcist, Legion and The Exorcism of Emily Rose.

Since I am admittedly a sucker for this genre I rate this movie 7/10. But in some regards I agree with some of the other reviewers and to those who may not be into this genre and see this movie as a horror movie, I must be inclined to rate it 5/10. Still, a nice surprise indeed, especially since it is quite hard to make decent horror movie.

Thank God (pun intended) that finally an exorcism/possession movie has an original storyline. This added a couple points to the review from the start. The acting was good and the story moved along w'out boring dialog or stupid character decisions. The later always ruins horror films. Also had some humor so it didn't take itself too serious like other films. I enjoyed this much more than I thought I would. I always watch anything horror related.

Even though this is a mixed bag in some regards, I have to admit that some of the ideas were actually pretty decent and new - at least to me. And I liked them a lot.

There are some negatives, such as the slightly insecure direction and camera work. It felt like director and DoP were kind of... holding back and sometimes even struggling to keep a consistent tonality. Sometimes, the film gets outright Raimiesque in tone, but unfortunately without the famous Raimi swag. The editing could have been a bit tighter at times, and the colour grading was a bit inconsistent, but the sound design, the score and the overall atmosphere were surprisingly good, along with the practical effects and some VFX.

Considering the fact that this was a very low-budget movie, this was way better than expected, and I hope the creative team gathered some experience and gets a much higher budget next time. If you're a horror fan like me, this will be quite interesting to you.