3 o'clock tick tock
You know what's really sad? False advertising. Specifically, deceptive packaging. If you were standing in Blockbuster and happened to pick up The Exorcism of Emily Rose and look at it, it would appear to be little more than another cheesy horror flick. In fact, if you were to pop in the DVD and look at the start menu, it would still look very cheesy. Not until you actually start the movie can you have any inkling that it is not, in fact, just an assembly-line rip off of The Exorcist.
The only indication any of our family (at least, those of us who were watching the movie) had that Emily Rose was any good was an obscure reference to it somewhere in the flotsam of the Catholic.com forums. It was with some trepidation that we popped the disc in and pressed play.
However, despite our first impressions, it turned out to be a very good movie. Why? Several reasons:
1): It's scary. Duh. Of course, it's not that hard to make a movie scary; just make all the lighting dim, use a lot of squealy violins, and use the standard tricks to build up suspense (i.e. have your protagonist approach a door at the end of a hallway veeery slooowly while the door rattles for no apparent reason and the violins, of course, screech ominously). Emily Rose had all these features in it, but there were numerous other things that just jumped at you without any build up, things that you didn't see coming at all but still scared the daylights out of you.
2): It does not totally botch its portrayal of Catholicism. In fact, its portrayal of demonic possession, exorcisms and general Catholic teaching on those subjects is very true to reality. It does not make the idea of possession seem like a silly superstition, in fact, it presents a fairly powerful case for it, however...
3): ...It does not give you definite answers. The movie never clearly shows whether Emily's condition was indeed caused by possession or if it was an extremely severe psychological problem. It leaves you to decide for yourself what seems most likely, but at the same time it forces you to ask very important questions, such as "Are there demons?" "Are there angels?" and "What is evil?".
4): It's well acted, especially in the case of whoever played Emily herself. The character of Emily undergoes incredible bodily contortions and holds them for a long time, undergoes extreme physical and spiritual pain, and does some...extreme things with her voice, all of which the actress playing Emily portrayed admirably. What you see in the movie is what the actress did; there was very little, if any, digital tinkering done with her image or voice.
If you aren't opposed to a good scare and to some thought-provoking material, I really recommend you see this movie--regardless of the cheesy looking cover.
The only indication any of our family (at least, those of us who were watching the movie) had that Emily Rose was any good was an obscure reference to it somewhere in the flotsam of the Catholic.com forums. It was with some trepidation that we popped the disc in and pressed play.
However, despite our first impressions, it turned out to be a very good movie. Why? Several reasons:
1): It's scary. Duh. Of course, it's not that hard to make a movie scary; just make all the lighting dim, use a lot of squealy violins, and use the standard tricks to build up suspense (i.e. have your protagonist approach a door at the end of a hallway veeery slooowly while the door rattles for no apparent reason and the violins, of course, screech ominously). Emily Rose had all these features in it, but there were numerous other things that just jumped at you without any build up, things that you didn't see coming at all but still scared the daylights out of you.
2): It does not totally botch its portrayal of Catholicism. In fact, its portrayal of demonic possession, exorcisms and general Catholic teaching on those subjects is very true to reality. It does not make the idea of possession seem like a silly superstition, in fact, it presents a fairly powerful case for it, however...
3): ...It does not give you definite answers. The movie never clearly shows whether Emily's condition was indeed caused by possession or if it was an extremely severe psychological problem. It leaves you to decide for yourself what seems most likely, but at the same time it forces you to ask very important questions, such as "Are there demons?" "Are there angels?" and "What is evil?".
4): It's well acted, especially in the case of whoever played Emily herself. The character of Emily undergoes incredible bodily contortions and holds them for a long time, undergoes extreme physical and spiritual pain, and does some...extreme things with her voice, all of which the actress playing Emily portrayed admirably. What you see in the movie is what the actress did; there was very little, if any, digital tinkering done with her image or voice.
If you aren't opposed to a good scare and to some thought-provoking material, I really recommend you see this movie--regardless of the cheesy looking cover.
posted by James at
2:29 PM
