Stigmata

Rating

Director

Rupert Wainwright

Screenplay

Tom Lazarus, Rick Ramage

Length

1h 43m

Starring

Patricia Arquette, Gabriel Byrne, Jonathan Pryce, Nia Long, Thomas Kopache, Rade Sherbedgia, Enrico Colantoni, Dick Latessa, Portia de Rossi, Patrick Muldoon, Ann Cusack

MPAA Rating

R

Review

PREFACE:
In the early 2000s, I was writing reviews for an outfit called Apollo Guide Reviews. That website has since been closed down.

Attempting to reconstruct those reviews has been an exercise in frustration. Having sent them to Apollo Guide via email on a server I no longer have access to (and which probably doesn’t have records going back that far), my only option was to dig through The Wayback Machine to see if I could find them there. Unfortunately, while I found a number of reviews, a handful of them have disappeared into the ether. At this point, almost two decades later, it is rather unlikely that I will find them again.

Luckily, I was able to locate my original review of this particular film. Please note that I was not doing my own editing at the time, Apollo Guide was. As such, there may be more than your standard number of grammatical and spelling errors in this review. In an attempt to preserve what my style had been like back then, I am not re-editing these reviews, which are presented as-is.

REVIEW:
In Stigmata, the death of a Catholic historian leads to a theological quandary of catastrophic proportions. The film stars Gabriel Byrne as scientist Andrew Kiernan, who followed his faith into the priesthood. Now he works for the Catholic Church investigating mysterious sightings of religious significance. Such sightings include walls with water-stains resembling the visage of the Virgin Mary and statues that cry tears of blood. The latter of these, Father Kiernan is investigating when he is called back to Vatican City to report his findings and subsequently sent to the United States to investigate a young woman who has begun to display stigmata, the wounds that Christ received when he was crucified.

Patricia Arquette plays Frankie Page, the young woman whose tumult begins with an unexplained hand piercing. Soon she takes on other inexplicable wounds, including apparent whip marks across her back and thorn-cuts around her head. When she begins showing signs of possession, Kiernan starts unravelling a mystery surrounding the unfinished translation work of Father Delmonico (Dick Latessa). Delmonico was on the verge of translating a gospel that would have turned the Christian religion upside down, and his death was the reason for the crying statue Kiernan was investigating before being assigned this case.

Arquette, sister to fellow thespians David, Alexis and Rosanna, has been acting on the big screen since the late 1980s. In Stigmata, she gives the same manic performance she gave in 1987’s A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors, but this time manages to keep it believable. Byrne delivers a stagnant and unemotional performance as the love-stricken priest who must question both his faith and his vows of chastity in the face of great evil.

The story is a bit far-fetched and many of the situations feel forced, but, overall, its moral questions bear examination. The film probes the desire of organized religion to suppress ideas that may challenge the very fabric of their existence.

The film shows us three priests, working in disjunction, who have to translate a manuscript where they may each only examine one out of every three pages and must keep everything secret. One of these sections describes the love of Christ to permeate life without need of a place to worship. This is why the church must keep it quiet and refuse to acknowledge its potential truth.

If it were not for the simple desire to question the motivations of an organization whose outward appearance is one of scepticism, Stigmata would be a complete wreck of a film. The film does not wish to disprove any religious belief or cause a mass exodus from organized religion; it merely wants to help its audience examine truth for itself and not let an amorphous body dictate how or where faith should be expressed.

Deeply religious in itself, Stigmata tries hard to be a social commentary. Director Rupert Wainwright makes a terrific argument using Tom Lazarus and Rick Ramage’s contemplative screenplay, but with his heavy-handed technique, most audiences will leave without true understanding of the intent behind the work.

Review Written

October 29, 2002

Original Review

Note: This is a Resurfaced review written in 2002 or earlier. For more information, please visit this link: Resurfaced Reviews.

From the dawn of man, humans have searched for ways to explain anything they didn’t understand. Most of these searches have been resolved by attributing them to a higher power; a benevolent deity or pantheon of gods and goddess who wields a punishing, yet loving arm.

Patricia Arquette plays a young artist named Frankie Paige. After she receives a rosary as a gift from her vacationing mother in Mexico, she begins displaying several horrific marks on her body known as stigmata. Stigmata are wounds that faithful believers in God display as they get closer to Him. The marks correspond those inflicted on Christ when he was crucified, in the wrists and feet where he was nailed to the cross, on the head where the crown of thorns pierced his brow, on his back where he was heavily whipped and in his side where a soldier speared him.

After receiving the first of these marks in a visually horrific manner, the Catholic Church sends one of their priestly investigators, Father Andrew Kiernan (Gabriel Byrne), to determine if they are legitimate. What he discovers is that they are indeed stigmata and as each new mark appears, she edges closer to death.

Arquette is never more than adequate. Her innocent, yet imperiled performance seems stolen from Linda Blair in “The Exorcist” without the impact. Byrne does the best he can with a somewhat intelligent, mostly superficial script, but can’t pull himself far enough out of the mire to matter. Jonathan Pryce is the Cardinal who sends Kiernan on his errand, yet attempts to cover everything up he can. He is perfect for the role, but it is tiring to see him play the villain every time he makes a film.

The film is completely fictional, but constantly tries to make itself real so that its final statement against the Catholic Church is damning. Unapologetic or not, “Stigmata” doesn’t provoke more than a passing concern over the refused acceptance of a long-lost Biblical gospel.

What the film DOES succeed in is its use of visual effects to induce each of Frankie’s marks. Alongside the visuals, the sound effects make a great impact on the film itself. They are superior to many other films released this year and if there’s justice, the film will be nominated in the blockbuster-favoring category.

If the film had better performances and a less horrific script, the subject matter might be able to rise to a plateau to be examined by film scholars and audiences alike as a thought-provoking message movie. As it stands it is little more than an artificial, presumptuous action movie.

Awards Prospects

The chances of Stigmata winning an Oscar lie in its outstanding Sound Effects. Unlikely, however, considering the Star Wars juggernaut. Potential nomination also in Makeup.

Review Written
November 16, 1999