Today, I wish to mourn the career of Russell Crowe. Let me start by saying I never liked Russell Crowe. His frequent combination of smarmy and thuggish never appealed. However, only a fool would dismiss his star power and former A-List status. And, yet, whatever he was then clearly isn’t happening now demonstrated by another crappy lead role in another crappy exorcism film.
The last film I saw Crowe in was The Pope’s Exorcist, yet another second-rate Christian-themed horror. [At least that one was an intentional horror as opposed to, say, Unsung Hero.] The decidedly underwritten The Exorcism feels like, “Hey, Russell, do you still have your costume from the last film? Let’s make another.”
From what I can tell, the only reason The Exorcism exists is because Russell Crowe is in it. In 95 minutes, the film failed to identify a legitimate villain, hero, or plot. Former A-List actor -sound familiar?- Tony Miller (Crowe) lands a part as the head priest in an Exorcist-like film. I’d like to say that’s where the trouble began, but who knows what the film was going for? The first half of The Exorcism is entirely ab
out Miller’s tired relationship with his estranged daughter and his inability to rise to whatever moment the script requires.
At home, there are hints of something wrong – Tony’s sleepwalking trance, for instance- but nothing to suggest “horror.” Not even a little. The cinematographer compensated by making the film really dark, cuz dark = scary, I guess. At some point, we realize that Sam Worthington is in the film (wow, remember when he was a leading man? Me neither). Horror kind of coincides with this awareness, but not really. As I said above, The Exorcism never quite got to identifying some key things you might need in film. The result is a horror entirely based on Crowe’s acting and bad lighting.
I’m told that Russell Crowe wanted to take some personal time away from Hollywood – which accounts for his fall from grace. Are we sure it wasn’t his personality? The “personal time” thing makes for a nice story, but the career facts state otherwise. He keeps working. He keeps being in films, only instead of starring in blockbusters, he’s now either taking smaller roles and getting by on face/name recognition or bigger roles in absolute crap films. At this point, Crowe is a half-step away from starring opposite Bruce Willis or Dolph Lundgren in something that goes straight-to-Hulu. Geez, at least with Will Smith or Kevin Spacey, we could clearly identify how an Oscar winner became a non-entity. This is just sad.
There once was an actor named Crowe
An Oscar-winning star, doncha know?
But his career hit a snag
Now all he can bag
Is the lead in a one-week-run show
Rated R [I guess], 95 Minutes
Director: Joshua John Miller
Writer: M.A. Fortin, Joshua John Miller
Genre: Horror movies that wouldn’t scare children
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: Sam Worthington believers?
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: Anybody who has seen it
