The Exorcism of Emily Rose (2005)

I’ve not worn the full set of rosary beads to bed since the last time I watched this film. It’s based on a true story that of Anneliese Michel a German woman who mysteriously acquired an American accent and went to an American College, and whilst there she heard voices. Her family didn’t know she was German and decided to beat it out of her.

Aldous Huxley The Devils of Loudon is one of those books I read years ago and it also scared me. The devil does that to people, that’s why he’s the devil. The problem is his most potent weapon is just lying low. If he’s busy swooping about banging doors, starting fires and scaring the horses then that means he exists. And if he exists that means God exists. There’s nothing worse that getting people all self-righteous.
And if the devil had any sense instead of all that Aramaic and dead languages he would just say things like ‘Hi, I seen you wanking in the towel cupboard at work. Don’t think you can pull the wool over my eyes.’ Any would be exorcists would then slink away. Instead they scream and battle back, denouncing Satan in a language they don’t really understand.

Laura Linney is far too pretty to be a defence lawyer and Tom Wilkinson, as the priest that performed the exorcism, works miracles as the priest who looked the devil in the eye and said boo. The Virgin Mary also makes an appearance, not in actuality of course, but as a vision seen by Emily Rose, because if the Virgin Mary exists then…But that is the very point the Virgin Mary is making in her letter. Emily Rose’s suffering shows the world that there is another dimension, that of the spirit. Maybe I’m confusing God and the Devil, or am I missing something here? What was all that suffering for again?