"The shocks and scares hit like a punch to the jaw," says Steve Barton of DREAD CENTRAL. I mean, just the name of the website itself sounds movie title, doesn't it? And I don't know about you, but I definitely want to be socked in the jaw by a horror movie. I was so scared that I accidentally crushed my drink between my thighs at the sight of the demon/woman breaking her own femur. I also me peed myself. (Thank God the Sprite™ covered the stain).
Joe McCabe at FEARNET says it's "A disturbing new look at the secret world of exorcists." I don't think you really need anything more than a quote from a site called FEARNET. I could not permission to use reviews from SCREAMBLOODYMURDER.COM or EYESTURNEDINSIDEOUT.ORG, but the next review is the clincher.
"This is the film the Vatican doesn't want you to see," says Naibe Reynoso of CARACOL RADIO 1260. This is THE morning radio station to listen to, so when I heard that they were endorsing a movie that the Vatican doesn't, I was sold. To date, I've seen the movie ever night for the last 40 nights, only skipping the daytime screenings because of work. (And I'm thinking of giving that up to become a "DEVIL INSIDER," my own term for the film's groupies, of which I'm pretty sure I'm the first member here at Atlanta's AMC North Dekalb 16.
The movie is an impressive tour-de-force of shocking sounds, dizzying camera angles, and vomit-inducing scares. My date and I had such a good time holding eachother's hair and patting eachother's backs while letting our fear out ALL OVER the theater floor that I knew we were hooked.
The best news: you don't even have to see the film to enjoy it — the trailer was what first hooked me. When a young woman named Isabella decides to reconnect with her long-lost mother (now living in an Italian insane asylum where she has the freedom to express body modification by scratching her wrists in a fashion normally only seen on someone dragged through barbed wire) I thought, "Heck yeah I want to see this!"
The doctors in Italy apparently don't have any silly restrictions on leaving a relative alone with someone convicted of triple homicide. I mean what could go wrong, right? From looking at the sweet-faced mother, I think all she really needs is a hug. But not before she shows her daughter, Isabella, that body modification isn't just restricted to the outside. Like a good Catholic, the mother shows us that the cross is something that's appropriate anywhere. Even scratched on the inside of the lower lip. (At least you can't ever lose it, right?)
Last is the treatment that the daughter and mother/Maria/Demon-infested-vesicle-of-evil get from the charitable priests/scientists. This is apparently the New Vatican that believes in the union of science and religion — I'd say it's downright "fuzzy."
When the sci/priests show Isabella one of their current exorcism projects in a filthy Italian basement that looks like the Roman's built it for slaves, well, it just shows such promise for her mother's treatment. When that gymnast on the bed does a full back bend, and THEN crawls up the wall, I thought, "Just imagine how flexible her mother will be when they're done!"
Maybe the surest sign that this movie is a horror film is when the poor misbegotten mother sings "Itsy Bitsy Spider." When anyone signs or hums a children's nursery rhyme while strapped to a medical/exorcism table, you just know you're in for quality horror.
So my recommendation is to clear your weekend, just off your Match.com favs and start lining up the dates!
- Your Movie Critic
No comments:
Post a Comment