The Movie
Michael Kovak (Colin O'Donoghue) comes from a clan where you either grow up to be a mortician or a priest. So when he decides to walk away from the family mortuary, sure enough, he winds up at the seminary but, just short of graduation, he experiences a sudden crisis of faith. Rather than give him a disappointed kick to the curb however, the Father Superior convinces him to take a specialized course at The Vatican: Amid an unprecedented rash of reported demonic possessions, the world is in short supply of trained folks to perform The Rite of Exorcism, so Michael is going back to school.
What ensues is a tutorial not just for him but for us, what oft-misunderstood exorcisms are and how they work, scientific and theological approaches, although frankly this movie doesn't dig very deep or take us anyplace new. It's all neat and easy in the classroom, until Mike interns with a strange Welsh priest (Anthony Hopkins), and then the serious weirdness begins. (Evil frogs...?) This pairing sums up much of why this would-be scarer is such a dud: O'Donoghue is a blander-than-bland pretty boy, his character ultimately a vapid observer, while Hopkins just hams his way though yet another potboiler.
At this point, Mark Grady's review of The Rite is all that's left.
The Picture
The 2.4:1 image of The Rite is pleasingly crisp, with virtually no significant noise or grain. Visually, the movie relies upon many dimly-lit scenes, and happily the blacks are quite natural, often extremely detailed. The edge enhancement was slightly more pronounced here than on some other discs I've reviewed recently, and I noted only one potentially problematic bit of flicker, in a panning shot over a hard-lined lampshade. Otherwise this one is definitely above average.
The Sound
The DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 soundtrack boasts extremely active, well-utilized surrounds, starting early with creepy voice and wind effects. It's also infused with the surprisingly evocative musical score, lots of atmospheric rain, some thunder, and even a discrete bell ringing here or there. The bass beats are impressively solid, and the track also includes some interesting surprises as well as outright jolts. Sonically, this disc was better than expected.
The Extras
The roughly-seven-minute featurette "The Rite: Soldier of God" introduces us to Father Gary Thomas, the Vatican-ordained exorcist whose experiences formed a loose basis for the film, with a rare look inside the real Exorcism Academy and true tales from the front lines. There's also a somewhat clichéd alternate ending (about two minutes) and four deleted/extended scenes, about twelve-and-a-half minutes total, but unchaptered. All of these extras are in HD. This Blu-ray also supports BD-Live.
Disc Two is a hybrid DVD carrying the movie in standard definition plus a Digital Copy for iTunes and Windows Media.
Final Thoughts
Respectable technical quality aside, where are the chills? The suspense? And for that matter, the plot? Uninspired and soon-to-be-forgotten, where did The Rite go wrong?
Product Details
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