Thursday, October 30, 2008

31 Days of Horror: The Exorcist

October 30, 2008: The Exorcist
The Exorcist, the movie many consider the scariest movie ever made. The film was released to the public in 1973 and quickly became a nationwide success. People were actually fainting in theaters after seeing the horrific images the movie shows and religious groups constantly boycotted it. Yet, it had huge box office returns.
The film centers around a young girl named Regan (Linda Blair), a 12 year-old who has been recently possessed by the devil. Her mother, Chris (Ellen Burstyn), becomes aware of her daughters strange behavior and exhausts ever medical effort to find a cure. She soon discovers that her daughter’s condition can’t be solved medically but spiritually and recruits Father Damien Karras (Jason Miller) to perform an exorcism.
Karras is not only dealing with the supernatural in this film, he also has scarce faith and displaced quilt over his mother’s recent death.
During the exorcist he is joined by a strange Jesuit exorcist Father Merrin (Max von Sydow) and together they have to confront the evil that possesses young Reagan.
The great thing about this movie that I really admired about it is how it grounds itself in realism and has the everyday tone, and then it lets the terror come in slowly and then hits you hard with it.
Watching the movie now, it still holds up and remains a classic. If you had to choose a movie for Halloween that will really give you a scare I would go with The Exorcist.

1 comment:

Tiffany Ventura said...

Hi James!

There is nothing scarier to me than the Exorcist, simply for the questions it raises and the reality of it, in some sense. I still can't watch the movie at night, alone, ever.

Love the blog! Just found it and I'll keep reading.