The True Story Behind The Pope's Exorcist (2024)

It's safe to say Hollywood has maintained its obsession with possession. It's obvious with HBO Max (soon to be known as Max) planning a Conjuring TV series. Not to mention, there's a fourth Conjuring movie in the works from the archives of the Warrens.

In addition, TheExorcist has a reboot in production, reinforcing that the entertainment industry still thinks demonic movies are a major draw. The Pope's Exorcist falls into this category, with the exaggerated story of Father Gabriele Amorth. His journey takes him to Spain to save a young boy, and due to the real-world Amorth documenting thousands of exorcisms before he died in 2016, moviegoers are wondering how much of this story is true.

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Who Is Father Gabriele Amorth?

Russell Crowe plays Father Amorth, someone the actor admits he's fascinated by due to his larger-than-life presence. The real-world Amorth was born in Modena in Italy in May 1925. He fought during World War II for the Italian resistance against what he deemed to be fascists, before pursuing legal studies.

He was ordained a Roman Catholic priest in 1954, before being appointed an exorcist of the Diocese of Rome in June 1986. During that time, he claimed to have conducted more than 50,000 exorcisms, detailing them in articles and books to share insight into the threat of evil.

The movie alters this with Crowe's Amorth being much younger, but it does share insight into his time in the war and how it inspired him to use religion thereafter as a means of cleansing the world. The movie omits his controversial views towards other religions, yoga and fantasy books.

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Did Father Amorth Really Have Vatican Backing?

The film's Amorth works directly for the Pope, going on missions across the globe to suss out who is possessed and who is mentally ill. This is something the real Amorth noted, writing about many subjects in need of psychological help. In the movie, these methods are considered rogue by fellow priests, leading to castigation, but the Pope endorses his agent.

The real-world Amorth worked directly with the Chief Exorcist Servant of God, Candido Amantini. Amorth would also partner with the likes of French exorcist Father Rene Chenessau before establishing the Vatican-recognized International Association of Exorcists in Rome in 1990. He remained president of the organization until his retirement in 2000. Notably, The Pope's Exorcist has Daniel Zovatto as the fictional Father Esquibel, who joins Amorth's mission to later forge a team similar to the association at the movie's end.

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Are Henry and Rosaria's Cases True?

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The Pope's Exorcist: Gabriel Amorth books & true story - Auralcrave

The Pope's Exorcist has Amorth working on Henry, who's possessed by the King of Hell, Asmodeus. The priest is haunted by his own sins, though, as he feels guilt over the death of a young girl, Rosaria. Amorth revealed he mishandled her mental illness, which led to her death while hinting she was sexually abused within the walls of the Vatican.

In Henry's case, it's an amalgamation of many stories Amorth logged, nodding to Linda Blair's Regan MacNeil. This tracks to why Exorcist director William Friedkin released a documentary in 2017, The Devil and Father Amorth, about the priest's journey, even cataloging a case. However, the Rosaria story has a deeper cut that links to Emanuela Orlandi, a teenager who mysteriously disappeared while returning from music class in 1983.

Amid tons of speculation and theories, Amorth claimed she was taken by Vatican police for sex parties with foreign diplomats and was eventually murdered. Some felt it was his way of lashing out at the Vatican for trying to cover up the truth. From the way the movie's Amorth talks about Rosaria and the sexual abuse, it's a clear statement on the Orlandi case. Interestingly, the Vatican in 2023 reopened investigations into the unsolved mystery, giving The Pope's Exorcist a subtle sociopolitical edge through Rosaria's tragedy.

The Pope's Exorcist is now in theaters.