The Catholic Chic is a personal and faith-based blog on the life of a Catholic woman in the modern world.

Thursday, July 10, 2014

Back to Back Movie review: Deliver us from evil // The Rite

" But the Lord is faithful, and he will strengthen and protect you from the evil one" - 2 Thessalonians 3:3

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For my first movie review, I would like to discuss two of the most interesting "horror" flicks I've ever seen - Deliver Us From evil and The Rite. Honestly, I'm not a fan of horror flicks and I've never really counted horror flicks as Christian, but somehow these two were able to grab my interest. 

They both captured my attention so much. I honestly cried while watching both in the cinema. Why? Because the stories touched a deep place in my heart immensely.

Here are some synopses and reviews from external sites on both movies to give you a gist of the story. These contain tons of spoilers by the way and some disturbing images. Here is the link for Deliver us from Evil and some links for The Rite here and here

From en.wikipedia.org.
From Google Images
What I love and what I learned:

The Rite is one of the most moving films I've watched in 2011, while Deliver us from evil is one of the most Catholic horror films I've seen, ever. At hindsight both may be categorized under the horror movie genre because they capitalize on the audience's fright - what with the eerie sound effects and the obligatory appearance of a scary figure every so often.

So both are scary movies, but they ended more as the inspirational types for me. Both movies struck me hard since they contain a lot of truths that I can relate to and have been contemplating about. 

The truths I learned from the movies strengthened the voice of faith inside me. Some serious points presented in the movie that affirmed and strengthened my faith include the following:

1. Evil and the devil are real. 

2. The spiritual battle is real.
3. Not believing the devil will not protect you from it.
4. Prayer and faith in God are our pillars or strongholds.
5. God will never leave us.

6. We are called by God to be His instruments.
7. Our God is a God of renewal and resurrection.

In general, the films showed me God's love and the fact that many, if not all, of us truly are handpicked to be His instruments - born to make miracles in this world. 


It also showed how He is a God of sinners and is ready to forgive and renew us if only we would allow Him. 

These truths were depicted by the characters of Michael Kovak (Colin O'Donoghue in The Rite) and Ralph Sarchie (Eric Bana in Deliver us from evil) as they both started doubting the existence of God in the first parts of the film but in the end their faith was solidified. 

Both of them chose to dedicate their entire lives to work wholly for Him.  I was very inspired in the end parts since this is where they professed their stronger faith in God. 

Another point I would like to add is the reality of the spiritual battle between good and evil. In both movies, spiritual battles inside the hearts and minds of the characters were shown as well as spiritual battles outside of them. The characters interacted with evil forces which caused humans to sin and to commit heinous crimes. 

In today's world, we sometimes ignore the actuality of the spiritual battle and the power of our prayers to God. Both movies bring these fundamental truths to light, through an aptly broad platform which is the motion picture.

I hope you will also get to watch these films and be inspired by them. Take courage and learn from it (or get your Christian friends to watch it with you too). 

May you be empowered by the Spirit and may God bless you!

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