A priest from the Vatican, Father Andrew Kiernan (Gabriel Byrne) is sent to Sao Paulo, Brazil to investigate the appearance of the face of the Virgin Mary on the side of a building. While there he hears of a statue of the Virgin Mary bleeding tears in a small town outside of the city after the death of another priest. Meanwhile, a young woman in the United States of America, Frankie Paige (Patricia Arquette) begins to show signs of stigmata, the five wounds of Jesus Christ.
For a movie that was just made in 1999, Stigmata is quite dated. The cinematography is good, but some sequences are shot in a pop video style which was all the rage back in the 90's and it gets very ridiculous at times. I'm not a Christian, but the movie is anti-church, but not anti-god. There's a galore of conspiracy by the church which isn't exactly news to anybody. There's a lot of symbolism here though. I loved the water droplets scene which was symbolic of a non-believer like Patricia Arquette's character getting baptized after she slowly started to admit there might be a higher entity (I think all so-called 'Gods' were probably aliens or advanced human beings). It encourages you to question and ponder about what you believe is the truth.
The quote: 'the Kingdom of God is inside you, and all around you, not in mansions of wood and stone. Split a piece of wood... and I am there, lift a stone... and you will find me' is somewhat similar to what the oldest religion (a very loose term to define it) in the world, Hinduism, which is rooted in Vedic tradition says - 'Aham Brahmasmi' - 'I am God' and thereby, everywhere, everything and everyone (trees, animals, humans, space among countless other things) has a God inside themselves and we just have to adhere to a moral code. I just find religions very intriguing. The main drawbacks of the movie are the music, the stylized shots and the very annoying Hollywood ending. Its an enjoyable movie with good performances by the actors though.
7/10
For a movie that was just made in 1999, Stigmata is quite dated. The cinematography is good, but some sequences are shot in a pop video style which was all the rage back in the 90's and it gets very ridiculous at times. I'm not a Christian, but the movie is anti-church, but not anti-god. There's a galore of conspiracy by the church which isn't exactly news to anybody. There's a lot of symbolism here though. I loved the water droplets scene which was symbolic of a non-believer like Patricia Arquette's character getting baptized after she slowly started to admit there might be a higher entity (I think all so-called 'Gods' were probably aliens or advanced human beings). It encourages you to question and ponder about what you believe is the truth.
The quote: 'the Kingdom of God is inside you, and all around you, not in mansions of wood and stone. Split a piece of wood... and I am there, lift a stone... and you will find me' is somewhat similar to what the oldest religion (a very loose term to define it) in the world, Hinduism, which is rooted in Vedic tradition says - 'Aham Brahmasmi' - 'I am God' and thereby, everywhere, everything and everyone (trees, animals, humans, space among countless other things) has a God inside themselves and we just have to adhere to a moral code. I just find religions very intriguing. The main drawbacks of the movie are the music, the stylized shots and the very annoying Hollywood ending. Its an enjoyable movie with good performances by the actors though.
7/10