"The Rite": Anthony Hopkins brings the evil!:
More schizophrenic than its diabolically infested characters, "The Rite" is partly a slow-burning horror flick and partly a Vatican recruitment video. God knows the Roman Catholic Church needs a new P.R. initiative, with the priesthood advancing in age, declining in numbers and, shall we say, a bit shorn of its traditional prestige. So why not cast studly young Irishman Colin O'Donoghue as a doubt-plagued Yank seminarian who finds the divine strength to tangle with the Father of Lies and the brooding charisma that makes the chicks swoon? I mean, they swoon chastely, and at a distance, and with their pants on, because he's a eunuch for the kingdom of heaven and all. Or he's about to become one, or something; "The Rite" kind of wants to have it both ways on the sex stuff, which may also be how Michael Kovak, O'Donoghue's character, feels about it. Ambiguity can be hot too!