A Closer Walk With Thee is described on IMDB as “A homoerotic Evangelical exorcism film.” It was definitely Evangelical, kinda homoerotic, and the exorcism remains ambiguous as to what exactly these young people were trying to purge from themselves. It’s an interesting film that makes us ask more questions than it could ever answer. Sometimes that works, sometimes it doesn’t.

The film follows four young Evangelical missionaries currently stationed in a shithole neighborhood in East LA, which they believe they can rid of Satan’s influences; to them, these influences are pretty much anything fun (i.e., drugs, alcohol, homosexuality). They remain extremely devoted to their work, until one of their members, a young man named Jordan, uncontrollably develops romantic feelings towards his super hunky mission companion, Eli. Jordan does his best to push his desires down and to rid himself of these “perverted” thoughts, but the group starts to come apart when one girl in their group catches him masturbating while watching Eli in the shower.

The group remains convinced that all the “evil” they see is the work of Satan, but it’s difficult to pinpoint exactly where Jordan’s homosexual “demons” come from. They see it as the literal work of some evil gay spirit, but could also be interpreted as his inability to suppress his desires, which finally explodes. Either way, Eli and this other girl try to perform an exorcism on Jordan, who shows them quite graphically that you can never pray the gay away.

The most interesting aspect of the story is the portrayal of the internal conflict of faith vs. sexuality, and Knight pulls it off well, carrying much of the film on his shoulders with a sympathetic performance as Jordan. Even so, it isn’t told in a way that’s original or interesting enough to be a nice refreshment from the rest of LGBT films, which often have the same theme.

Being fair, I’m not sure if A Closer Walk With Thee was supposed to be a horror film, which led me to look for things that weren’t there. It’s an intriguing and bold story, and though the film lacks the panache and timing to truly make it suspenseful and terrifying, the merging concepts of extreme religious fundamentalism and its abusive effects on the human psyche are, in theory, absolutely horrifying.

It’s not the most aesthetically pleasing film, but at the risk of sounding overly pretentious, I appreciate its approach to narrative realism and keeping the film’s environment simple and minimalistic, which made it all the more realistic.

A Closer Walk With Thee is the film equivalent of finding an obscure and intriguing piece at an art museum, but you become a bit confused when your tour guide starts talking about how “shocking” or “provocative” it is. Am I just disaffected and jaded? I can’t tell anymore.