Interview with an exorcist- 'The Devil and Father Amorth'

Rome, Italy, Jan 23, 2018 / 15:00 pm

A documentary on the ministry of Father Gabriele Amorth, popularly known as the "Vatican exorcist," will be released this spring. The film was directed by William Friedkin, director of the 1973 movie "The Exorcist."

"The Devil and Father Amorth" will be released April 20, Deadline reports.

The film follows Amorth during the events surrounding the exorcism of an Italian women in 2016.  Amorth died in September 2016 at 91, shortly after filming was completed.

"I had been curious to meet Father Amorth for many years and when he granted permission to meet and film him in Rome last May, it was the opportunity to complete the circle and see how close that film came to reality," Friedkin told Deadline.

During filming, Friedkin was present at an exorcism, which he said he had not previously seen personally, despite his work on "The Exorcist."

"In the early 1970s when I directed 'The Exorcist,' I had not witnessed an exorcism but I wondered how close I had come to portraying reality," he said in an interview with Variety.

The documentary interviews Amorth about the exorcism of an Italian woman, referred to as "Rosa," who, Amorth said, struggled with demonic mood swings and convulsions, which were reportedly heightened on Christian holidays like Easter.  It includes a video recording of the event.

Father Amorth was born in Modena in northern Italy on May 1925. Twenty years later, the man joined the Congregation of the Society of St. Paul, and was ordained a priest in 1951.

In 1985, Father Amorth was appointed an exorcist by Cardinal Ugo Poletti, vicar general of the Diocese of Rome. Amorth claimed to have performed thousands of exorcisms. He was the author of "An Exorcist Tells His Story" and "An Exorcist: More Stories."