Review of The Rite (2011) by Nathan H — 07 May 2013

The Rite is a possession horror movie starring Anthony Hopkins and Colin O'Donoghue. Why is it that every year, studios release far too many possession/exorcist movies that they need to? This exorcist movie offers absolutely nothing new to the genre. Anthony Hopkins gives a decent performance as always and for me, he is the highlight of the movie. Acting opposite of Hopkins is Colin O'Donoghue, the lead actor in the film. O'Donoghue (in his acting debut) gives a completely bland and uninspired performance and he sounds like hes completely bored. Maybe in a few years he'll mature as an actor and get better? It's certainly possible, but this is a pretty miserable debut.

As a horror movie, the film is completely unoriginal and completely devoid of any scares. Even though there is a distinct lack of scares, the movie does feature a lot of unsettling images and cringe-inducing exorcist body-contortionist type stuff, which is probably what most people paid to see.

The film's pacing is also a but uneven. The first act of the movie unfolds at almost glacial pace and is extremely boring and even laughable at some parts (there is an unintentionally hilarious scene where a woman gets hit by a car). The middle section however, is actually fairly intriguing and it held my interest for 30-40 minutes or so where we see Hopkins slowly becoming more and more possessed. Solid middle section aside, the movie falls into the trap that most possession movies fall into: THEY ALL HAVE THE SAME ENDING. This movie's ending is very unoriginal and not scary what-so-ever because it relies heavily on old exorcism cliches.

The PROS of this movie are a decent performance from Anthony Hopkins, a few unsettling images and a solid, semi-interesting middle section.

The CONS of this movie are the numerous pacing issues, a laughable first act, a cliched and derivative ending, terrible performances by everybody who isn't named Anthony Hopkins and a lack of scares.

I'd give this movie (4/10).