“When a Filmmaker Sees Horror in Real Life”

Whether this counts as a review or not is sort of up to the beholder; I don’t think it’s review-ish, myself, but I wonder if it might read that way to others. Regardless, I approached writing about William Friedkin’s The Devil and Father Amorth from a more specific place. It’s mind-blowing to me to watch Friedkin, the director of The Exorcist, sit down and record an actual exorcism in fucking Rome of all places. That’s wild. Nobody gets to do that, meaning a) nobody gets to record exorcisms, and b) nobody gets to actually stare down the horror they’re known for making movies about. This is a once in a lifetime kind of thing. Whatever misgivings I have about the film, the meta element at play here is fascinating, so I dug into it for The Hollywood Reporter.