The Exorcist (1973)
Spooky Season 2023
In a move that did not earn my mother a vaunted Parent of the Year Award, I saw The Exorcist for the first time in theaters when a director’s cut was put out in 2000. I would have been eight. And folks you’re not going to believe this, but eight years old is way too young to see The Exorcist. It scared the piss out of my pants. I remember climbing under my seat to try to get away from the movie. It didn’t work. No matter what I tried to do to stop watching, my eyes stayed on the screen. I didn’t want to see what was going to happen next. I had to see what was going to happen next. It was like I was *ahem* possessed.
The Exorcist really has it all. A good hearted priest battling a crisis of faith. Arrogant doctors being confronted with the limits of scientific thought. People slowly climbing stairs to face a monster lurking behind a closed door. Unnatural cold. Green puke. Levitating beds. The hilarious conviction that Catholicism is a force for Good. And most importantly, a little girl who can rotate her head 360 degrees.
I’m being facetious about it, but this is a great movie that expertly uses archetypal horror tropes to tremendous effect. Recently deceased director William Friedkin (RIP) employs a mastery of tonal control and a well calibrated sense of how to pace the escalation of the young girl’s demonic possession. Ellen Burstyn’s desperate advocacy for her child provides the movie with a vital emotional core. Linda Blair gives one of the best child performances in movie history as the possessed girl. Max Van Sydow is cool as hell, as usual. The make up/special effects team absolutely cooked.
Being a little older and having seen the movie so many times, I do have to wonder: A demon possesses a human and all she does is lay in her bedroom upstairs in her upper middle class Washington, D.C. home? If you were a demon, wouldn’t you take your human body out for a spin on the town? Do some drugs, drink some beers, party like it’s 1999? What exactly is the demon getting out of this experience? Seems like a missed opportunity to me. But what does an angel like me know?