Opening Credits: Lower Your Expectations
Let’s get this out of the way: if you ever wanted to watch The Exorcist but thought, “You know what would make this scarier? Cutting the budget, moving it to Showtime, and replacing pea soup with Timothy Dalton’s brooding eyebrows,” then congratulations — Possessed is for you. For the rest of us? It’s an 86-minute sermon that feels like 86 years of Catholic guilt wrapped in the aesthetics of a Hallmark Channel reenactment.
Father Bowdern: James Bond, But Sad and Catholic
Timothy Dalton plays Father William Bowdern, a man so haunted by his WWII trauma that he spends most of the film looking like he’s about to audition for a PSA on PTSD. He once refused to give a dying soldier last rites, got bayonetted for his trouble, and now drinks like he’s preparing for a Guinness world record. You’d think this would make him fascinating. Instead, it makes him stumble around muttering in a way that feels less like “troubled priest” and more like “actor wondering why he agreed to do this after playing Bond.”
The film desperately wants us to sympathize with him, but every time he clenches his jaw, you can practically hear Dalton thinking, God, I used to have a license to kill. Now I’m stuck with a license to bore.
Robbie: The Kid Who Needs a Time-Out, Not an Exorcism
Our demon-child this time around is Robbie Mannheim, who’s less terrifying and more bratty with a Ouija board. He starts small: knocking chairs over, scratching things into his belly, and smashing clocks. By the midway point, he’s peeing on priests, vomiting like a frat pledge, and screaming in Latin like he just got dropped in the middle of a Vatican spelling bee.
Honestly? Most of his behavior looks less like “demonic possession” and more like “undiagnosed ADHD meets bad parenting.” His mom nags, his dad yells, and Aunt Hanna encourages séances like it’s a wholesome hobby. By the time Robbie’s throwing temper tantrums and swearing, you’re rooting for Child Protective Services, not the Holy Spirit.
The Supporting Cast: Because Every Bad Movie Needs More Priests
Henry Czerny plays Father McBride, whose main function is to stand around, furrow his brow, and occasionally get scratched. Christopher Plummer, bless him, shows up as Archbishop Hume — a man so committed to modernizing the Church that he thinks ignoring demon possession is the PR strategy of the year. Piper Laurie wanders in as Aunt Hanna, who teaches Robbie about ghosts and then promptly dies, sparing herself from having to watch the rest of the movie.
You’d think with Dalton and Plummer, you’d get gravitas. Instead, it feels like they’re competing to see who can collect their paycheck the fastest and escape the set before the craft services table runs out of instant coffee.
The Horror: Sausages, Pee, and Catholic Bureaucracy
Now, the film is technically a “horror” movie, but its scares are about as frightening as a jump scare in a VeggieTales episode. For example: a frozen sausage smashes through a classroom window. Yes, you read that right. The Devil’s weapon of choice in this film isn’t lightning, plagues, or hellfire — it’s breakfast meats. Later, Robbie urinates on priests. Is that supposed to be terrifying? It’s not Satanic. It’s toddler behavior.
The bulk of the horror isn’t supernatural at all. It’s bureaucratic. Watching priests sit around debating whether exorcisms make the Church look old-fashioned is about as spine-tingling as watching people file taxes. The Devil himself doesn’t even bother showing up — he clearly had better engagements.
The Pacing: A Battle Between Yawns and Flashbacks
The pacing of Possessed is a special kind of torture. Every time something vaguely creepy happens, the film slams on the brakes for another Bowdern flashback to WWII. It’s like watching two bad movies spliced together: one about a war-traumatized alcoholic priest, the other about a bratty kid who may or may not be possessed. By the end, neither story resolves in a satisfying way, but hey, at least Dalton gets to look pained in two different contexts.
The Exorcism: Wet, Loud, and Boring
The final exorcism should be the payoff, right? The big showdown of good vs. evil? Instead, it looks like a middle-school drama club’s reenactment of The Exorcist if their props budget was capped at $50. Robbie thrashes around, screams obscenities, and occasionally spits. Bowdern sweats, prays, and has flashbacks. The supporting priests get scratched like bad catsitters.
After what feels like a week, Robbie is suddenly “cured.” The room is locked away by order of the Archbishop, presumably because even the Church was embarrassed by how underwhelming it all was.
The Themes: Catholic Guilt, But Make It Showtime
Possessed desperately wants to be about faith, trauma, and redemption. What it actually ends up being about is how dull those themes become when handled with all the subtlety of a sledgehammer. Bowdern’s alcoholism? Mentioned constantly but never explored. Robbie’s trauma? Reduced to bad CGI scratches and tantrums. Institutional racism, church politics, and WWII guilt are sprinkled in like garnish, then forgotten when the plot remembers it’s supposed to be a horror movie.
The Real Possession: Of the Viewer’s Time
The true horror of Possessed isn’t the demon inside Robbie — it’s the possession of your time. Ninety minutes of this feels like a slow-motion exorcism of your will to live. It’s the kind of film that leaves you longing for death, or at least the sweet relief of the end credits.
If you were hoping for genuine scares, you’re out of luck. If you wanted theological debate, you’d be better off dusting off a Catechism. And if you wanted Timothy Dalton doing literally anything else, may I suggest literally any other Timothy Dalton movie?
Final Verdict: The Devil Works Hard, But Showtime Works Harder to Waste Your Time
Possessed tries to ride the coattails of The Exorcist and ends up tripping over them instead. It’s too self-serious to be campy fun, too cheap-looking to be genuinely frightening, and too boring to justify its existence. The most demonic thing about it is the way it sucks the life out of your living room.
If you must watch a possession story, go with the classics. If you want Timothy Dalton, go with Bond. If you want to combine priests, guilt, and boredom? Well, Possessed is waiting for you.
