À une époque où la quête de sensations fortes se fait parfois au détriment du reste, il est bien de noter que «The Rite» n'abuse pas trop des effets chocs gratuits.

Hafstrom, who also made the 2005 thriller Derailed, with Clive Owen and Jennifer Aniston, is a master of pacing, and while the film runs a full two hours, the slow build never feels like a drag.

You need a character that doesn’t believe, just as you need one that’s blindly assured. You need fake scares and real scares and a creepiness that builds until some conflict-resolving final act. The Rite has all that, as well as one very good acting performance, but just as it builds into something truly powerful, it completely undercuts itself by introducing a largely irrelevant side character and asking another to behave totally against personality. For the love of Beelzebub, this could have been one of the all time greats. Instead, it’s just a missed opportunity.

It has satisfying moments, but the movie is so slowed by talk, unnecessary characters and some odd symbolism (including a possessed donkey) that the battle for souls seems to be lacking a little heart. There's nothing wrong with The Rite that spinning heads and a little pea soup wouldn't cure.

Lenser Ben Davis gives "The Rite" a chilly, clammy look that aptly enhances the impression that, at any moment, Kovak is going to learn another harsh lesson about dealing with the devil. Other tech values are similarly first-rate.