‘The Exorcist of the Pope’, a movie inspired by the real-life case of the priest Gabriele Amorth, premieres April 6, starring Russell Crowe

Inspired by the actual archives of the priest Gabriele Amorth (1925-2016)who served as the Vatican’s Chief Exorcist, the tape The Pope’s exorcist follows Amorth (Russell Crowe) as he investigates the terrifying possession of a child, ultimately uncovering an ancient conspiracy which the Vatican has desperately tried to keep hidden.

Known by some as the Dean of Exorcists, Gabriele Amorth was a light in the dark for thousands of people as a man who performed thousands of exorcisms for the church and recounted in two memoirs (available on Amazon) that go far beyond the creepy anecdotes to investigate the threats to humanity by demons.

Now, those writings of Father Amorth are coming to the big screen for the first time. “Actually, in the Vatican there is a real job called Head Exorcist,” says Crowe, the protagonist. “Father Gabriele Amorth was a real man who held that position for 36 years and was involved in tens of thousands of exorcisms.. And when you do something thousands of times, you get really good at it.”

In the movie, Amorth is also a man of strong religious beliefs and an obsessive researcher. In the movie Father Amorth and his partnerFather Esquibel, played by Daniel Zovattoinvestigate a property in the Abbey of San Sebastian in Castilla, Spain, where a young family is renovating the old building. “Those events took place during some of the darkest days of the Catholic Church, when punishment was meted out to people who fell short of the depth of their beliefs. We all thought this was an excellent way to dive into the history of Spain.”

“He’s certainly a man of deep faith, but he’s also very confident in himself,” Crowe adds. “He is determined to be open and direct; he is not afraid of the shortcomings of mankind. Accept all people’s weaknesses and quirks, it’s that simple. The instinct-based level of honesty helps you do your job.

The film was directed by Australian director Julius Avery, who believes that the priest Amorth as a character is distinguished by his appearance and contradictory, but in fact perfectly logical beliefs: a well-educated man, a skeptic well-versed in modern psychology who is also an ardent believer in the power of God and the devil . “I think 98% of everything can be explained by science,” Avery said. “But there’s that last 2% that you can’t, and that’s what we explore in the movie.”

Other producers had unsuccessfully tried to convince Amorth to turn his memoir into a movie.But Michael Patrick Kaczmarek he has it. “I think I was able to succeed where other producers failed because I was able to convince Father Amorth of my sincere religious devotionKaczmarek explained. In our conversations I was able to convince him that if he agreed to work with me, I would try to ensure that the catholicity of the film was maintained. And? he would be respected as a person along with the church and also his religious order.

“These memories are a treasure trove of hundreds of stories, anecdotes, real cases of Father Amorth exorcising demons. The sky was the limit as to the number of stories we could tell.r,” says Kaczmarek. “My producing partners and I have always presented him as the ‘James Bond’ of exorcists. There is a whole collection of stories and a whole universe of stories that could be put together from the two memories”.