Catholic Guilt

Film: Immaculate
Format: DVD from Sycamore Public Library on basement television.

Immaculate is the second movie about nuns I’ve watched in three days; the other one will show up in the July wrap-up early next month. Neither of the two movies show the church in a positive light. For Immaculate, that lens is going to be one of horror and trauma. It’s worth saying that I am fortunate in my religious past. I didn’t experience any undue religious trauma—nothing more than the typical indoctrinated fear of Hell anyway, and I was also never a Catholic. Immaculate is going to play on the much darker reputation of the Catholic Church, and anyone who has dealt with any Catholic trauma or church trauma in general is going to likely be upset by this.

That said, while the religious trauma aspects of the film aren’t going to trigger anything specific in me, the opening scene certainly is. A young nun (Simona Tabasco) breaks into the room of the Mother Superior of a convent in Italy and steals a ring of keys. She tries to escape but is attacked by four nuns who break her leg and knock her unconscious. When she comes to, she finds herself in a coffin being buried alive. I am claustrophobic, so this was very difficult to watch, although arguably not the most difficult part of the film.

We shift immediately to Cecilia (Sydney Sweeney), who has arrived in Italy to take her vows as a nun. We learn that despite her age, she is taking her vows because she believes that this is her destiny. She had a serious accident as a child, falling through ice and being dead for several minutes before being revived. In her mind, she was revived for a purpose, and that purpose is to live her life as a nun. One imagines that for her, the attractiveness of the priest, Father Sal Tedeschi (Álvaro Morte) helps her decision. And that decision is a tough one—while the church is reputed to have one of the nails used in the crucifixion, the abbey itself is used to tend to dying nuns.

Almost immediately, things start to seem strange. Some of the older nuns have cross-shaped scars on the bottoms of their feet, for instance, and Cecelia starts having terrible nightmares. And then we get the turn of the story. Cecelia is suddenly questioned about her past, particularly her sexual past. The priests force an examination on her and they discover that despite the fact that she is still a virgin, she is pregnant, and she is soon being treated as the successor to the Virgin Mary. And things don’t get any better. Cecelia is attacked by another nun who tries to drown her, and then commits suicide. Investigation reveals that the convent has a file on her, including her accident from when she was a child. Worse, her friend Sister Gwen (Benedetta Porcaroli) has a fight with Father Tedeschi, and Cecelia sees her being brutally punished.

Immaculate is not slow burn, but is instead a film that slowly reveals information, but keeps up the disturbing revelations and information to keep the audience interested. And that is the genius of the film. We are going to go to some truly terrible places by the end of the film. The final 10 minutes or so are brutal, the kind of images that don’t fade, but we build there naturally and with care. When we get to the final act, it feels very much like we have earned where we go.

Much of the strength of Immaculate is in the performances, all of which are good, and all of which are anchored by Sydney Sweeney. Sweeney has the absolutely correct screen presence for the “good for her” genre. She is immediately sympathetic and also has the sort of quality that allows the audience to believe that she can genuinely take care of herself when she needs to and that she is capable of the sort of acts the become necessary for her own survival.

Another element that makes the film work is that a great deal of it is in Italian, and not all of it is translated. That puts the non-Italian speaking part of the audience, who I have to imagine is most of them, in the same position as Cecelia, whose Italian is rudimentary. To help reinforce this, there are times when we do see the translation, but the person who is translating for Cecelia does so poorly and intentionally mistranslating. Cecelia is always in the dark about what is happening until the terrible reality is revealed.

Immaculate is not the sort of film that one enjoys, but it’s definitely the sort of film that one appreciates, provided they can sit through it. Horror movies have long had a strange relationship with the Catholic Church. The Church is both angel and demon, and for my money, the Church being made a villain is necessary; it has a lot to answer for, and there are elements of Immaculate that seem like a comment on the bodies found around the indigenous schools in Canada.

Why to watch Immaculate: Beware the church!
Why not to watch: If religious trauma upsets you, you’ll want to stay away.