#The vatican tapes reviews movie
This movie tries to follow the footsteps of movies like The Omen, which is all about the coming of the Antichrist. Think about it – creepy wizened white men starting at the screen to footage of you in the bathroom or changing room, all in the name of watching for the Devil’s work to show up. The only creepy thing about The Vatican Tapes is its assertion that the Roman Catholic Church has footage of all of us doing everything… everywhere. The exorcism subgenre should probably have ended a long time ago (or at the very least taken a breather), and whereas The Vatican Tapes could have been a refreshing reminder of why the genre lives on, it’s instead another nail in the horror trope’s coffin.Main cast: Olivia Taylor Dudley (Angela Holmes), Michael Peña (Father Lozano), Dougray Scott (Roger Holmes), John Patrick Amedori (Pete), Djimon Hounsou (Vicar Imani), and Peter Andersson (Cardinal Bruun) Under Neveldine, though, the film languishes, ditching whatever promise it has for a unique horror movie and haphazardly employing found footage, shaky hand-cams, and subpar plotting and pacing.
![the vatican tapes reviews the vatican tapes reviews](https://www.horrordna.com/images/reviews_q_w/the-vatican-tapes/the-vatican-tapes-01.jpg)
He replaced James Marsh ( Man on Wire), whose involvement surely would have made for a very different film. Based on synopses of that incarnation of Borrelli’s script, it had a lot more going for it six years ago.) Neveldine ( Crank, Gamer, Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance, and writer of the even worse Jonah Hex) wasn’t the original director attached to the project. (The script probably has its shortcomings, too, though it was featured on 2009’s Blacklist, Hollywood’s insider list of the year’s best unproduced screenplays. Peña must have known the role and the film were a waste of his talents he has never looked so disengaged on screen before, as if incapable of hiding his boredom even while the cameras rolled.įault for the end product most certainly falls on many people’s shoulders, but blame can easily be placed on Neveldine.
![the vatican tapes reviews the vatican tapes reviews](https://www.ioncinema.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/Aneesh-Chaganty-Run-Review-2020-400x240.jpg)
He’s boiled down to a token priest spouting ineffectual platitudes to a distressed father and boyfriend. He does everything he can to save her, until the exorcism, when he, too, takes a back seat. What they distill Lozano down to is a priest who, having never met Angela before and after only glimpsing her a few times, comes to suspect she’s been taken over by a demon. It’s an incredibly interesting setup for a priest (especially in an exorcism movie, where one might expect him to employ his previous training in some active fashion), but Neveldine and writing team Chris Morgan and Christopher Borrelli instantaneously abandon this backstory. For starters, Lozano is established as a war vet who took up the cloth when he had seen too much killing. Yet, his role as Father Lozano is both perplexing and disappointing. This leaves the incredibly talented Peña to carry the film. So we don’t get much of him at all, which is a shame. Hounsou plays a Vatican-based vicar who remains behind in Europe when another church official flies to the States to perform the exorcism.
![the vatican tapes reviews the vatican tapes reviews](https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/vatican_tapes.png)
The film is billed as starring Michael Peña and Djimon Hounsou, but that’s far from the case. Lionsgate has employed some tricky marketing in bringing The Vatican Tapes to the public, because clearly the powers that be there know it needs whatever help it can get. Can they save her soul? It doesn’t really matter the film isn’t worth watching. Olivia’s father, beaux, and a priest-Father Lozano (Michael Pena), who catches on all too quickly that she’s possessed-do what they can to spring her from her hellish captor, including committing her to both a hospital and a mental institution. On her birthday, she becomes the unlucky recipient of a demon seeking out a new soul to corrupt. Director Mark Neveldine’s addition into the subgenre, The Vatican Tapes, misses every opportunity it has to distinguish itself and rapidly disappears into the pack.Īngela (Olivia Taylor Dudley) is a young woman living with her boyfriend. Because of how ubiquitous they’re becoming, exorcism movies need to do something different to stand out from the growing herd. They require minimal cast, basic special effects, and can be shot in essentially a one-room set. Movies about demon possession seem poised to replace vampires as the latest in-vogue horror movie craze.