Stigmata

USA 1999

Reviewed by Stephanie Zacharek

Synopsis

Our synopses give away the plot in full, including surprise twists.

Pittsburgh, the present. Frankie Paige is a hairdresser who doesn't believe in God. After receiving a rosary in a package of Brazilian souvenirs, she begins spurting blood from wounds that have opened of their own accord which directly correspond with Christ's crucifixion wounds. Father Andrew Kiernan, who investigates religious phenomena, is sent from the Vatican to look at Frankie's symptoms. He dismisses them because she's an unbeliever, but he finds himself drawn in by her case.

Frankie's attacks worsen. Possessed by the spirit of a priest who died in the process of translating a newly discovered gospel, she begins writing texts in a language not used since Jesus' time. Kiernan fears Frankie's affliction will kill her, and the two begin to fall in love. When a power-hungry and corrupt cardinal realises Frankie may have some knowledge of the newly discovered gospel which the Church is trying to keep secret, he pulls Kiernan off the case. The cardinal and his henchmen abduct Frankie and try to kill her. Kiernan rescues her in the nick of time.

Review

The supernatural pseudo-mystical thriller Stigmata is something of a mess, a roughly chopped slaw of spiritual hokum and scaremongering ripped off directly from The Exorcist (1973). Director Rupert Wainwright's previous credits include music videos and commercials. This CV is written all over Stigmata, with its convulsive cutting and ubiquitous, meaningless close-ups. Huge chunks of the plot make no sense (particularly a demonic-possession subthread) and Patricia Arquette, generally a marvellous and graceful actress, gets lost in the movie's manic shuffle.

But for lapsed Catholics especially, Stigmata holds its share of perverse delights. Vehement in its distrust of the Catholic Church, it features demons and beasties and treacherous priesties, as well as lots of hyper-Catholic visuals like statues that cry tears of blood and fluttering flocks of doves that radiate out of thin air. Gabriel Byrne, playing a special-task-force priest, looks more soulful and sexier in cassock and clerical collar than he does in normal street clothes. He's like the Vatican James Bond, only his job is a hundred times harder: he's a babe magnet and he can't do a thing about it.

Arquette is too good an actress to throw away the whole movie. Her smile is pure delight, with the gentle surprise of those funny eye-teeth, and she and Byrne have some charming flirtatious scenes together. Otherwise, though, her Frankie has little to do but bleed profusely. And when the stigmata hits, it descends like a bad Warrant video, all furious cross-cutting and abrasive noise. We see spikes going through wrists; thorns pressing into tender flesh; and blood spurting, dripping, coagulating and doing just about everything blood can do - all set to jarring industrial clanking music. The effects move so quickly that you don't have much time to dwell on their grisliness, but they're still queasy-making and unpleasant, and only underscore Stigmata's shortcomings. Stigmata is lethargic and self-consciously edgy at the same time. Instead of being elegiac and creepy, it scrabbles for a false kind of downtown grittiness.

And when Wainwright tries to strike a more spiritual note, Stigmata just gets plain goofy: after her episodes, Frankie becomes bathed in ethereal light as Enya-like noodlings waft by on the soundtrack. Draped in a snowy bedsheet and holding a dove in her hand, she does a remarkable impersonation of St Francis of Assisi. Many mysteries in Stigmata remain unsolved: why is it constantly raining inside Frankie's apartment? Why does the spirit of a supposedly benevolent priest speak through her in a voice deeper than Barry White's? And can stigmata really be caught from contact with a rosary? If so, wouldn't a little ringworm medicine or an aspirin take care of it?

Stigmata is interesting only because it isn't really very nice. It refuses to genuflect before one of the world's great religions. It doesn't seem to care whom or even if it offends, which makes it naughty, florid fun for ex-Catholics of all stripes. But that doesn't make it any good. At least Byrne is allowed to bring some glamour to it, a little ecumenical savoir faire. If only they'd given him an Aston Martin DB5.

Credits

Director
Rupert Wainwright
Producer
Frank Mancuso Jr
Screenplay
Tom Lazarus
Rick Ramage
Story
Tom Lazarus
Director of Photography
Jeffrey L. Kimball
Editors
Michael R. Miller
Michael J. Duthie
Production Designer
Waldemar Kalinowski
Music
Billy Corgan
Elia Cmiral
©Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures Inc.
Production Companies
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures presents an FGM Entertainment production
Line Producer
Vikki Williams
Production Supervisors
Mexico Unit:
Anna Roth
Italy Unit:
Michele Colombo
Production Co-ordinators
Tracy L. Kettler
Mexico Unit:
Belinda Uriegas
Production Manager
Italy Unit:
Antonio Bruno
Unit Production Manager
Perry Husman
Unit Manager
Italy Unit:
Elisabetta Moretti
Location Managers
Scott Logan
Mexico Unit:
Gloria 'Pekas' Lozano
2nd Unit Director
David Barrett
Assistant Directors
Benjamin Rosenberg
Kristina Peterson
Eric Fox Hays
Terence Edwards
Basil Grillo
2nd Unit:
Mark Oppenheimer
Mexico Unit:
Miguel Lima
Efren Del Moral
Script Supervisors
Jeanne Byrd Hall
2nd Unit:
Nancy Friedman
Casting
Wendy Kurtzman
Associate:
Rita Vanderwaal
Mexico Unit:
Claudia Becker
Voice:
Barbara Harris
Italy Unit Helicopter Cameraman
Enrico Lucidi
2nd Unit Director of Photography
Flemming Olsen
Camera Operators
Michael St. Hilaire
David Crone
Mexico Unit:
Guillermo Rosas
Steadicam Operator
David Crone
Visual Effects Editor
Peter Elliot
Visual Effects Supervisor
Tim McGovern
Visual Effects Producers
Joan Collins Carey
George Merkert
Pre-visualization Inferno
Sonja Burchard
Visual Effects
Dream Quest Images
Visual Effects Producer:
David McCullough
Digital Co-ordinator:
Kathryn Liotta-Couture
Digital Effects Supervisor:
Blaine Kennison
Lead Compositor:
Saki Mitchell
Compositors:
Brian Adams
Rory Hinnen
Cynthia Hyland
Dave Lauer
Frank Maurer
Daniel Miller
Tony Noel
Jeff Olm
Marc Scott
Visual Effects Editor:
Daniel Arkin
Data Manager:
Doug Sherman
Special Effects
Co-ordinator:
Al DiSarro
Foremen:
Robert Graham
John Bruce Robles
Mexico Unit, Supervisor:
Jesús 'Chucho' Durán
Art Director
Anthony Stabley
Lead Set Designer
Clint Durst
Set Designers
Maria Baker
Peter Davidson
Barry J. Lehrman
Theodore Sharps
Set Decorator
Florence Fellman
Costume Designer
Louise Frogley
Costume Supervisor
Joyce Kogut
Key Make-up
Perri Sorel
Make-up
James MacKinnon
Key Hairstylist
Ron Scott
Hairstylist
Michael Reitz
Make-up Effects Supervisor
Ve Neill
Prosthetic Make-up Effects
Makeup and Monsters
Key Designer:
Brian Penikas
Shop Foreman:
Roy Ceballos
Special Life Castings:
Kevin Haney
Sculptors:
Greg Smith
Jacobien van der Meer
Mechanics:
David Penikas
Jimmy Hirahara
Elvis Jones
Mold Makers:
Rich Mayberry
Steve Newburn
Thomas A. Steves
Main Title Sequence Design
Diane Van Ussel
Monkeyshine
Main Title Sequence Compositors
Click 3X
End Titles
Hollywood Title
Opticals
Howard Anderson Co.
Additional Music
Mike Garson
Orchestrations/Conductor
Pete Anthony
Additional Orchestrations
Jon Kull
William Stromberg
Associate Music Supervisor
Genevieve Thomas Colvin
Executive Music Producer
Budd Carr
Music Editors
Ken Karman
Mike Flicker
Stephen Lotwis
Music Engineers
Bjorn Thorsrud
John Whynot
Music Mixers
Billy Corgan
Bjorn Thorsrud
John Whynot
Programming
Billy Corgan
Bon Harris
Soundtrack
"Mary Mary (Stigmatic Mix)" by Nigel Hunter, Bruce Duncan, Anne Holden, Louise Watts, Paul Greco, Darren Hamer, Allen Whalley, Judith Abbott, performed by Chumbawamba; "Cosmic Angel" by Michael Heinkel, performed by B.A.T.I.K.; "Gramarye" by Shelby Tate, August Cinjun tate, Cedric Lemoyne, Jeffrey Cain thompson, Gregory Slay, performed by Remy Zero; "All Is Full of Love" by Björk Gudmundsdottir, performed by Björk; "Now Is the Time (The Crystal Method Y2Kaos Mix)" by Ken Jordan, Scott Kirkland, performed by The Crystal Method; "The Pretty Things Are Going to Hell" by David Bowie, Reeves Gabrels, performed by David Bowie; "Release" by Simon Emmerson, James McNally, Iarla O'Lionaird, Martin Russell, Sinéad O'Connor, performed by Afro Celt Sound System featuring Sinéad O'Connor; "Inertia Creeps" by Robert Del Naja, Grantley Marshall, Andrew Vowles, performed by Massive Attack; "Identity" by Billy Corgan, Mike Garson, performed by Natalie Imbruglia; "O Sacrum Convivium" performed by Oxford Camerata
Production Sound Recorder
David Kirschner
Sound Mixer
Mexico Unit:
Fernando Cámara
Re-recording Mixers
Scott Millan
Bob Beemer
Dennis Sands
Supervising Sound Editor
Mark Mangini
Supervising Dialogue Editor
Curt Schulkey
Sound Effects Editors
George Simpson
Richard L. Anderson
Mike Chock
ADR
Recordist:
Rick Canelli
Mixers:
Troy Porter
Bryan Watkins
Doc Kane
Thomas J. O'Connell
Bob Deschaine
Greg Steele
Charlene Richards
Editors:
Curt Schulkey
Avram D. Gold
Foley
Artists:
John B. Roesch
Hilda Hodges
Alyson Moore
Recordist:
Carolyn Tapp
Mixer:
Mary Jo Lang
Editor:
Donald Flick
Technical Adviser
Robert Visciglia
Pre-visualization Consultant
Bill Marmor
Advisers
Italian:
Stephanie Carwin
Aramaic:
William Schniedewind
Portuguese:
Christine Nazareth
Medical:
Donna Duffy
Doctor Frederick Beddingfield
Religious:
Kenneth Corr
Douchan Gersi
Reverend Eddie Siebert
Stunt Co-ordinator
David Barrett
Animal Trainers
Birds and Animals
Cast
Patricia Arquette
Frankie Paige
Gabriel Byrne
Father Andrew Kiernan
Jonathan Pryce
Cardinal Daniel Houseman
Nia Long
Donna Chadway
Enrico Colantoni
Father Dario
Dick Latessa
Father Gianni Delmonico
Thomas Kopache
Father Durning
Ann Cusack
Doctor Reston
Portia de Rossi
Jennifer Kelliho
Patrick Muldoon
Steven
Rade Sherbedgia
Marion Petrocelli
Shaun Toub
doctor
Tom Hodges
nurse
Lydia Hazan
attending nurse
Duke Moosekian
Doctor Eckworth
Valarie Trapp
woman with a baby
Kessia Kordelle
Cheryl
Frankie Thorn
Donna's customer
Mariah Nunn
Sister Angela
Tom Fahn
MTA man
Marilyn Pitzer
homeless woman
Jack Donner
Father Paulo Alameida
Richard Conti
valet priest
Mary Linda Phillips
Sister Agnes
Liz Cruz
Faith Christopher
waitresses
Joe Ruffo
Federico Scutti
guards
William Howell
Kristopher Davis
aerialists
Devin Unruh
flower boy
Vera Yell
Jennifer's costumer
Mary Marshall
nun
Daniel Escalzo
Michael P. Dearth
Italian businessmen
Mark Adair Rios
Deacon
Certificate
18
Distributor
United International Pictures (UK) Ltd
9,200 feet
102 minutes 14 seconds
Digital DTS sound/DTS stereo
Colour by
DeLuxe
Super 35 [2.35:1]
Last Updated: 20 Dec 2011