by Jodi Minervino
I walked out of the theater at the end of a movie six days ago. I have not had a decent night’s sleep since. Not only did this movie hold my undivided attention for two hours, it literally scared the hell out of me.
The worst part is-it’s based on a true story.
“The Exorcism of Emily Rose,” tells the account of a lawyer named Erin Bruner (played by Laura Linney) as she defends Father Moore (played by Tom Wilkinson) against allegations of negligent homicide. Father Moore performs the religious ritual of exorcism on Emily to cleanse her soul of demonic possession and she dies a grisly death in his care.
Emily is dead at the start of the movie and we see her possession unfold in a series of flashbacks. Emily (played by Jennifer Carpenter) is an extremely pious 19-year-old girl who is first visited by demons one night while she is alone in her college dorm room. It is 3 a.m., a sort of “Biblical witching hour” when Emily awakes to the smell of burning and to the sensation that something is crushing her chest.
Things only go downhill from here. After that fateful night in her dorm room, Emily engages in bizarre behaviors such as eating spiders and trying to scratch and bite her way through walls. She sees ghastly images everywhere and she speaks in ancient tongues dating back to the time of Christ.
We watch as Emily becomes an empty shell of a person. She rips her hair out in handfuls and her once pretty face becomes bruised and battered from self-inflicted wounds. It is scary enough to think of ghost and demons that exist “out there,” but it is almost unbearable to watch evil attack someone from the inside.
Flash-forward to the present. As Erin Bruner gets more involved with the case, dark forces begin to enter her life as well. Bruner awakes every night at 3 a.m. to strange occurrences and this once-atheist lawyer begins to believe in the spiritual realm. Linney is extremely impressive in this role and keeps the viewer riveted as she explores Father Moore’s case.
Based on the real life exorcism of Anneliese Michel, a German college student, “Emily Rose” reaches its climax when Father Moore performs an exorcism on Emily. Taking place in a barn on a stormy night, the scene is ripe with hellish winds, terrified farm animals, demonic screaming and utter disarray as Moore demands the demon’s name. The possessed Emily answers back in riddles in a voice that raises the hair on the back of your neck. After much coaxing, she finally answers: “I am the one who dwells within.”
The exorcism is unsuccessful, as the viewers already know and Moore dedicates himself to telling Emily’s story, in what proves to be a sincerely touching and religiously provocative ending.
This movie will scare you. Although you will wake up at 3 a.m. and wished you hadn’t, go see it anyway.
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