The Exorcism of Emily Rose DVD Review (Laura Linney) Empire Movies

THE EXORCISM OF EMILY ROSE DVD REVIEW

The Exorcism of Emily Rose (Unrated)
(Columbia TriStar Home Entertainment)

The Movie

The Extras

Reviewed by

8/10

7/10

Liam

In The Exorcism of Emily Rose, Jennifer Carpenter plays the titular character, a small town girl who heads off to college in search of higher education but who instead wakes up at 3am one night and finds herself dealing with a higher power -- the devil. Possessed by the demon, she soon sees some pretty freaky stuff. Not quite sure what's wrong, she is prescribed some medication which doesn't really seem to work. So, she turns to her local priest, Father Moore (Tom Wilkinson). Father Moore convinces her to stop taking her meds and goes about treating her "condition" as a posession. Unfortunately, the exorcism he performs doesn't quite take and Emily Rose dies. Is Father Moore responsible? In walks Erin Bruner (Laura Linney), a lawyer hired to defend Father Moore on charges of being responsible for the death of Emily Rose. What unfolds is a courtroom drama that may make even the most doubtful person question what the hell happened with Emily Rose. Was she really just a basket case, or was she really posessed by the devil himself? And all this is based on actual events.

Even I'll admit that this movie freaked me out. I can take any sort of horror movie, but throw in a religious element and you'll scart the s**t out of me. I'm not even that religious -- just the thought that maybe, just maybe this all might be true is enough to send me running in the opposite direction screaming like a little girl.

Special features on this DVD include a running scene-specific audio commentary with director Scott Derrickson where he talks about your standard stuff including the story, the directorial choices he made etc., a single deleted scene that really didn't fit into the movie where Laura Linney's character picks up some guy at a bar (available with optional commentary), a "Genesis of the Story" featurette which I found to focus too much on the movie and not enough on the supposedly "true story" that the movie is based on (isn't that the "genesis of the story"?!), a "Casting the Film" featurette and finally a "Visual Design" featurette which looks at how the movie was filmed, the costumes, the sets and the locations. Basically, it's all your pretty standard stuff, but it works because it's all quite interesting. Again, my only beef would be that I would've liked more about the history and less about the film's production.

This film really worked for me -- both as a horror flick and a courtroom drama. In the movie, Laura Linney's character wakes up every morning at 3am -- which apparently is the devil's hour. (Traditionally, it is believed that Christ died at 3pm -- so the devil's hour is the exact opposite.) Well, I watched this movie one night when I couldn't sleep. For no reason at all, I woke up between 3 and 4am. I popped in the DVD and watched it from beginning to end. Every night for the next week I woke up at pretty much exactly the same time give or take a few minutes. Now that's pretty creepy. Hopefully I'm not posessed -- but if I was, I imagine the devil in me would recommend this movie.

Features
Audio Commentary with Director Scott Derrickson, Deleted Scene, "Genesis of the Story" Featurette, "Casting the Film" Featurette, "Visual Design" Featurette, Previews

Video
Widescreen (2.40:1)

Audio
English Dolby Digital 5.1

Subtitles
English, French, Closed-Captioned

Release Date
December 20, 2005

Rating
Not Rated

Length
122 mins.

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