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Movies & TV

04th Apr 2023

Russell Crowe recounts creepy experience he had while filming horror movie in Ireland

Stephen Porzio

russell crowe creepy experience

This might have freaked us out given the circumstances.

There have been many reports throughout movie history of cast and crew members experiencing creepy phenomena while filming making movies, with Russell Crowe being the latest example.

The Oscar-winner’s new chiller The Pope’s Exorcist arrives in cinemas this week and sees the Gladiator star play Father Gabriele Amorth, who was an Italian Catholic priest and served as the Chief Exorcist of the Vatican. Before his death in 2016, he claimed to have performed tens of thousands of exorcisms throughout his life.

Shot in Dublin and Limerick, the horror movie is said to be inspired by Amorth’s actual files and will revolve around the priest as he investigates a young boy’s terrifying possession. His probe leads him to “uncovering a centuries-old conspiracy the Vatican has desperately tried to keep hidden”.

When JOE interviewed Crowe for the film, we asked the actor if he had any spooky experiences while making the movie in Ireland. He told us:

“There was one little moment but I put it down to other things. We arrived back from shooting down in Limerick to the place we were living in on the coast there outside of Dublin and there was a dead bird in the doorway of the house that we were living in.”

However, Crowe believes there was a logical explanation for the discovery, adding:

“Being an old bushy, I just sort of put two and two together and realised that there must be some creature around there who had noticed that we weren’t there and had proffered the dead bird as a welcome home gift.

“I think with a lot of these things, it really depends on what you’re prepared to take in and whether or not you can remain objective and see these things and understand these things and still stop youself from sliding into the rabbit hole with that thought process.”

You can watch that full interview with Russell Crowe here:

The Pope’s Exorcist lands in Irish cinemas on 7 April.

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