Best Pictures That Never Were: Day 9

Year: 1973

Movie: The Exorcist

Best Picture Winner: The Sting

I'm a huge horror fan and when a horror movie is nominated for Best Picture it's just a big deal for me, because it doesn't happen that often.

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 a demon. 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. This film should of won best picture, forget about The Sting - The Exorcist and American Graffiti were better films in my opinion.