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Film Review: THE POPE'S EXORCIST (2023): Russell Crowe is Back in Fine Form in a Very Watchable Possession Film https://film-book.com/film-review-the-popes-exorcist-2023-russell-crowe-is-back-in-fine-form-in-a-very-watchable-possession-film/?feed_id=143593&_unique_id=643c50ff32604

🎥🎧movie time🍿🍩🍪 👿 The Unholy 👻 アンホーリー 忌まわしき聖地 💀 明るいうちに怖い映画を観る作戦ＤＥＡＴＨ☠️ 明るくてもびっくり箱的演出は心臓に悪い🫀 #theunholy #EvanSpiliotopoulos #SamRaimi #JeffreyDeanMorgan #HorrorMovie #HorrorFilm #hometheater https://www.instagram.com/p/ChR-ArFr0l5/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

The Unholy (2021)

The Unholy has ideas that would serve as primo material for a good horror film. Unfortunately, they’re buried under a septic tank’s worth of bad special effects, sloppy writing, and obvious developments. Worse, you aren’t given a shovel. Getting to the worthwhile stuff, means digging with your hands, and trust me, it's not worth it.

On a bogus assignment for a trashy publication, disgraced journalist Gerry Fenn (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) discovers Alice Pagett (Cricket Brown) praying out loud. A former deaf-mute, Alice has been seeing and hearing the Virgin Mary and now speaks on her behalf. The story catches the world by storm but Alice’s adoptive uncle, Father Hagan (William Sadler), is skeptical of all this divine intervention.

If you know this is a bad movie, you’ll spot why immediately. The pre-title sequence tells you EXACTLY what’s going on, which robs the film of all suspense. If you’re giving The Unholy the benefit of the doubt, you’ll be too enchanted by what the movie could do - at first. If you were a deeply religious person but you felt your faith wavering, you'd latch onto any sign. What if a sinister force took advantage of that desire? If you suspected the miracles being performed were all part of a sinister agenda… how would you prove it? Would you even realize it in time with the necessary period of skepticism? If we assume it’s the Devil doing all this, what’s the end game? What if - and this isn’t the case in this movie but it could’ve been if it were good - someone who believed in God wanted to prove his existence so badly they were willing to sell their soul to perform miracles? I bet your mind’s racing with ideas now!

The issues with The Unholy are numerous. There are obvious ones anyone would spot, like the special effects. They’re awful. Whether it’s flames, the demonic force behind Mary’s visions, or ominous dreams, they all look like something from thirty years ago when computer effects were just getting started. Less easy to spot but more damning is the lack of ambiguity. Once "Mary" senses an investigation, she appears in evil form and begins attacking. We're told her strength depends on the faith people place in her, so you can forgive that she doesn’t just kill all of her enemies immediately. The question is, why does she reveal herself as evil? You know what’s not going to deter a skeptic? Proving to them that you’re a fraud! Then there are revelations about the past that will make your eyes roll, extra villains introduced for no reason, and at the end, several events make you wonder what the headline the next day would be.

There are many cheap scares - some of which don’t match the rest of the film - and a couple of good ones that will keep hopeful viewers wondering if things will turn around. They don't. Any hope you have for The Unholy will vanish completely by the third act, which is big, and loud, and dumb. (July 4, 2021)

#HappyEaster from the #FridayNightHorrorShow #MeetUp 🐰🩸🐰🩸🐰🩸🐰 At 3 PM EDT let's go see #Unholy 2021 by #director #EvanSpiliotopoulos at #AMCHoffmanCenter22 - tickets at amctheatres.com. 🩸🛋️🩸🛏️🩸👗🩸 The #online #watchparties start at 7 PM EDT with #KillerSofa 2019 by dir #BernieRao followed by #DeathBedTheBedThatEats 1977 by dir #GeorgeBarry at 8:30 PM EDT and wraps up at 10 PM EDT with #InFabric 2018 by dir PeterStrickland #FNHS uses #Kast - Let's watch at https://s.kast.live/g/b7pqcss4jaa 🤓🛋️🍺🍕📺📡🎬🎞️🎭😱😷 #OoH #ilovehorrormovies #horrorkeepsmesane #SundayFunday #SundayMotivation #dontsitonthefurniture #socialdistance #selfquarantine #AMCMovieWatcher #AMCStubsAList (at Shirlington House Apartments) https://www.instagram.com/p/CNP0764LkPZ/?igshid=1il4gvi1r6ey3

THE UNHOLY Trailer: Journalist Jeffrey Dean Morgan investigates the holiness of Cricket Brown's Miracles in the 2021 Horror Movie https://tinyurl.com/yhp6q9o9