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Dec. 1, 2008

Max Freidlander, as told to Jacklyn C. Wadler: India Inkings

Mark Steyn: Whodunit!?

Nov. 28, 2008

Rabbi Ahron Rapps: An evil seed that didn't have to be

Melanie Phillips: Carpe diem --- or can we all relax now?

Nov. 26, 2008

Michael Feldberg: Meet the Orthodox Jew who laid groundwork for scientific development of ordnance that undergirds America's current world leadership

Andrea Simantov: Shades of life

Nov. 25, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir : Getting Emotional For Influence

The Kosher Gourmet by Ethel G. Hofman : Thanksiving feast!

Nov. 24, 2008

Rabbi S. Binyomin Ginsberg: 'I just Became a grandchild!'

Barry Rubin: Don't flatter your enemies, protect your friends

Nov. 21, 2008

Rabbi A. Henach Leibowitz: Money matters?

Caroline B. Glick: Civilization walks the plank

Nov. 20, 2008

Rabbi Avi Shafran: Bronfman's blindness

The Kosher Gourmet By Linda Gassenheimer: Portobellos add a hearty flavor to pasta with pesto

Nov, 19, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir : Spread the wealth? Jewish tradition and income equality

Elliot B. Gertel: 'Mad Men': Tackling prejudices or reinforcing them?

Nov, 18, 2008

Dr. Debby Schwarz Hirschhorn: The End of the Age of Reason

Jonathan Tobin: Does Barack + Bibi = Disaster?

Nov, 17, 2008

Rabbi Yonason Goldson: The End of the Age of Reason

Diana West: Gulling Americans into making terror legit?

Nov, 14, 2008

Rabbi A. Henach Leibowitz: The Power of Spiritual Inertia

Caroline B. Glick: The perils ahead

Nov, 13, 2008

Stratfor Intelligence Briefing: How Bush and Obama together could change the Middle East dynamic

The Kosher Gourmet by JeanMarie Brownson: Sweet and savory, crispy and meltingly tender bestilla

Nov, 12, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir : Tyrannical Co-Workers

Michael Doyle: High Court to consider today donated monuments that may have religious messages in public parks

Nov, 11, 2008

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: Will Obama stop government officials considering institutionalizing financial jihad?

Jonathan Tobin: They Will Decide Their Own Fate

Nov, 10, 2008

Rabbi Avi Shafran: $8 billion, modern-day Tower of Babel being built?

Barry Rubin: A letter to the president-elect from a Middle East realist

Nov, 7, 2008

Rabbi Francis Nataf: Of Children and Immortality

Caroline B. Glick: Livni's Obama strategy

Nov, 6, 2008

Rabbi Yonason Goldson: How I tricked a classroom of apathetic students into grasping the fallacy of moral relativism

The Kosher Gourmet By Gina Kim: Tips for making the perfect soup --- includes recipes

Nov, 5, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist By Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Destitute Debtors

Bruce Weinstein: 'Religulos': Bad title,even worse movie

Nov, 4, 2008

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: Treasury Dept. submits to Shariah law

Frida Ghitis: A surprise for Obama in the Middle East

Nov, 3, 2008

Jonathan Rosenblum: Who says Jews are Smart?

Jonathan Tobin: Was He Wrong About Everything?

March 22, 2007

J-Rhythms with Avraham Rosenblum: JWR's cutting-edge music program showcasing performers -- singers, song writers, musicians, and bands -- who learn and live the Torah lifestyle (OUR NEWEST IGODCAST !)

Oct. 29, 2003
Mortimer B. Zuckerman: Graffiti On History's Walls (MUST-READ!)

Jewish World Review March 3, 2006 / 3 Adar, 5766

Why did conservatives ignore Emily Rose?

By Julia Gorin


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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | Standing silently in contrast to all the Oscar hoopla this week is the most underrated, untalked-about movie of the year. That "The Exorcism of Emily Rose" didn't garner a single Academy nomination isn't surprising, but why didn't it win any notice from conservatives?


Granted, the title suggests a horror film, but "Emily Rose" is actually a courtroom drama about faith that takes audiences on a spiritual journey. In a departure from the cynical treatment that religion usually gets in Hollywood, the film's hero is a Roman Catholic Priest. Father Richard Moore, played stunningly by onetime Oscar nominee Tom Wilkinson, is on trial for the death of a girl on whom he performed an unsuccessful exorcism. In a further departure, Laura Linney — an Academy favorite who generally plays leftist heroines — is a defense lawyer who gains a conscience over the course of the story, and who asks the jury to keep an "open mind" on behalf of a Catholic priest.


In the film — based on events that occurred in the 1970s to a 19-year-old German co-ed named "Michel" — the charge is negligent homicide. As Laura Linney told MovieWeb.com, the issue of the case isn't about whether or not Emily was possessed, but whether Father Moore contributed to her death.


The prosecution's case is that Moore endangered Emily's life by persuading her to abandon her medical treatment in favor of religious treatment. In addition to punching holes in the prosecution's medical case, the Linney character, Erin Bruner, tries to validate the alternative — that is, the possibility of possession — in a court of law. She tells the jury, "Maybe you can't reconcile [Moore's] beliefs with your own, [but] after the failures of the doctors, he simply tried to help Emily in a different way."


Along the way, Bruner — an agnostic and a complacent, self-obsessed attorney who became a media celebrity when she got an accused murderer acquitted — is led not only to reevaluate her choice of profession when her former client strikes again, but also to undergo a spiritual awakening of her own. In her closing arguments, Bruner tells the jury that she is "a woman of doubt. Angels and demons, G-d and the Devil. These things either exist, or they do not exist…Either possibility is astonishing. I cannot deny that it's possible. And this trial is about possibilities….Is it possible that [Emily] was beloved by G-d and that she chose to suffer to the end so we believe in a more magical world?....That sincere belief determined her choices, and Father Moore's."


Echoing Linney's characterization of the film as one that would be a "balanced examination of these events" rather than a movie "that told people how to think," Belisa Silva, of Lehigh University's student paper "The Brown and White," writes, "I think the reason this movie scared me so much was because it doesn't push to make believers out of its audience. It merely presents the story and lets you decide for yourself whether you think Emily was truly possessed by demons or merely epileptic… Although exorcisms and possession seem ridiculous in today's society, the movie asks that we consider the possibility of its existence."


In fact, by asking us to consider whether or not demons exist, what the film is really asking us to consider is the existence of a spiritual world and therefore G-d. No doubt, for some audience members, it is that possibility that will be the most horrifying aspect of this "horror" film.


As the epitaph on Emily's grave reads, "Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling." (Philippians 2:12)

Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.

JWR contributor Julia Gorin is a widely published op-ed writer and comedian who blogs at www.JuliaGorin.com. Comment on by clicking here.

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© 2005, Julia Gorin.

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