Religious horror is difficult to get right. Immaculate received reasonably positive reviews, and did well enough at the box office. Its message of women being forced into reproductive roles unwillingly is certainly timely. Viewers with religious training, as well as experience viewing quite a lot of horror, might be less impressed. The basic premise isn’t bad: a convent in Italy, which has one of the nails from Jesus’ crucifixion, is using the biological material on the nail to genetically engineer a new messiah. The movie follows the novice/nun Sister Cecilia, a virgin, as she joins the convent and discovers that she’s pregnant. The entire community—apart from a jealous nun and a friend trying to warn Cecilia—welcomes the news, presenting Cecilia as the new Mary.
The convent, which has a history of torture, realizes that Cecilia might be reluctant. Past sisters have, and she isn’t the first immaculate conception the resident priest (a former biologist) has engineered. Realizing, by the second trimester, that something sinister is going on, Cecilia tries to escape but is caught and confined, and her soles are branded to prevent her from running away. After killing the Mother Superior, a Cardinal, and the resident priest, she does escape, gives birth, and kills the baby. It’s not difficult to see the social commentary involved, but this is body horror and it’s not about gross outs. It is pretty tense and has several scary moments, but the plot leaves some rather large holes that might following it difficult. It’s never explained, for example, how the genetic material ends up inside Cecilia without her knowing it. For those who’ve spent years reading about Marian devotion, this is not an unexpected question.
Although this would be a candidate for Holy Sequel, there’s just something off about the religious elements of the film. Having never been a nun, I can’t say for sure, but the convent life (apart from the engineering a messiah) seems inaccurate. And although the Bible is quoted, it’s presented in an almost Protestant way. The underlying religious imagery feels slightly askew. Judging from what critics have said, that doesn’t seem to bother many viewers. If you’re going to make a religious horror movie, it is possible to get away without doing your homework. In the end, however, it shows. The acting is quite good and the theological message is worth arguing over, but like many other religious horror films, it has been weighed in the scales and found wanting.