Oct 061999
 
two reels

After receiving the rosary of a deeply spiritual priest as a gift from her globetrotting mother, a Pittsburg woman (Patricia Arquette) begins bleeding from her wrists and taking on the other torments of Jesus. A scientist-priest (Gabriel Byrne) is sent by the Vatican to investigate, not knowing that Rome’s interest is only to keep an ancient secret.

Biblical horror films have a troubling theology in general, but in Stigmata, it’s just weird. Apparently, priests can possess people and the effect is much the same as if demons did the possessing. The girl is possessed by a priest who in turn has the Holy Spirit in him, and it really sucks. She suffers. She screams. She is tortured by having nails driven through her wrists and ankles, thorns imbedded in her head, and she is whipped, and this is somehow a good thing. How, exactly, is this any better than what Regan goes through in The Exorcist?

To go with the odd behavior of God, there is the odd behavior of the Catholic Church. Not only is it suppressing the true word of Jesus, but every miracle on the planet (couldn’t a church gain power by using those miracles?). I can’t fault the acting, and while a bit too MTV, the film looks good. I kept waiting for it all to come to something, something interesting and original. But it doesn’t come to anything at all. The girl suffers, and then stops. The great secret comes to nothing. The peculiar similarity between receiving the Holy Spirit and being possessed by a demon comes to nothing. This is a well-made film, that runs for a while, and then stops. To say it is unsatisfying is an understatement. The way it was headed, it looked like God was going to be the villain, which would give the church a pretty good reason for keeping his real gospel a secret. But I guess messing with God is still taboo. I just hope the God of Stigmata doesn’t bless me; I couldn’t stand the pain.