Evan Spiliotopoulos: Last News

EXCLUSIVE: Angel Gomez (Arachnid) has been set to directDangerous Games To Play, a supernatural horror movie for former Sony exec Scott Strauss and Thunder Road’s genre label Badlands.  

Greece has selected Eva Nathena’s latest feature The Murderess as its submission for Best International Feature Film at the 97th Academy Awards.

The Hellenic Film Academy, Greece’s national cinema body, has said it’s “outraged” and is seeking clarity from the country’s cultural ministry after a series of chaotic government-mandated U-turns paralyzed the selection of Greece’s submission to the 96th Academy Awards. 

Guy Lodge Film Critic On the face of it, “The Pope’s Exorcist” would have you believe that it’s rooted in the real-life experiences of the late Father Gabriele Amorth, the Catholic priest who served for 30 years as the head exorcist of the Diocese of Rome. Its screenwriting credits proclaim as much, for starters, while a surfeit of onscreen dates and locations in the early going lend proceedings the faintest of docudrama veneers; moreover, the film is backed by the non-profit production arm of the Jesuit research university Loyola Marymount, with Loyola rector Father Edward J. Siebert among its executive producers. Even Catholics in high places, it turns out, have a sense of humor: You needn’t wait for the “work of fiction” disclaimer in the closing credits to discern that “The Pope’s Exorcist” is ripely fantastical trash, inspired by Amorth’s work in much the same way that SunnyD is inspired by Florida oranges, and no less enjoyable for those liberties. Rather than the Bible or any of Amorth’s autobiographies, Julius Avery’s film instead swears by the trusty story template shaped by every demonic-possession horror film since “The Exorcist” a full half-century ago, as a hapless American teen is inhabited by an ancient minion of Satan with increasingly yucky, upchucky consequences, while a venerable priest is called upon to clear up the mess.

EXCLUSIVE: Legendary Italian actor Franco Nero (Django) has been tapped to play the Pope in Screen Gems’ supernatural thriller The Pope’s Exorcist, with Laurel Marsden (Ms. Marvel), Cornell S. John (Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald) and newcomer Peter DeSouza-Feighoney also now set for the film from director Julius Avery. They join an ensemble led by Academy Award winner Russell Crowe, which also includes Alex Essoe and Daniel Zovatto, as previously announced.

EXCLUSIVE: Alex Essoe (Midnight Mass) and Daniel Zovatto (Station Eleven) will join Academy Award winner Russell Crowe in the Julius Avery-directed supernatural thriller The Pope’s Exorcist for Screen Gems.

Russell Crowe (Thor: Love and Thunder) has signed on to star in Julius Avery’s film The Pope’s Exorcist for Screen Gems, Deadline can confirm.

EXCLUSIVE: We also learned today that Paramount’s Snake Eyes: G.I. Joe Origins movie is moving up from its Oct. 22 release date to July 23. The G.I. Joe movies play younger and it only makes sense for the new standalone from EOne/Hasbro to play the summer.

By Mike Fleming Jr