Horror franchises are usually outlined by their immutability. Make a success within the style, and also you’re all however assured a slew of sequels that observe a good system: slasher movies the place a monstrous pressure stalks the youth, ghost tales set in creepy homes. However The Exorcist has at all times been completely different. The not too long ago departed William Friedkin’s 1973 movie was a box-office sensation—adjusted for inflation, it’s nonetheless one of many 10 largest films ever made. But each try to sequelize it has been a baffling, weird narrative swerve that takes the theme of demonic possession and locations it in a wildly completely different context.
That’s, till David Gordon Inexperienced’s new movie, The Exorcist: Believer, which follows the blandest of blueprints: Take the primary movie’s plot, repeat it within the current day with a number of tweaks, usher in well-known actors from the previous to lend on the spot credibility, and bam, you’ve your self a “legacy sequel.” Inexperienced did the identical factor along with his 2018 movie, Halloween, which paid direct homage to the unique and relied on star Jamie Lee Curtis; that spawned two sequels, and now Inexperienced is attempting the identical method right here. He’s tagged in Exorcist star Ellen Burstyn (now 90 years previous) to seek the advice of on a case of demonic possession for not one however—gasp!—two teenage ladies.
The outcomes are as predictable as you may anticipate. Exterior of the truth that it has two possessed topics, Believer is an easy exorcism film, largely following the plot of the 1973 basic. Stricken dad and mom (performed by Leslie Odom Jr., Jennifer Nettles, and Norbert Leo Butz) watch as their younger daughters endure from inexplicable medical signs and behavioral modifications which are finally deemed to be demonic, necessitating an exorcism. Fifty years in the past, Friedkin’s movie depicted the ritual by displaying the sufferer writhing violently, cursing in a guttural voice, and emitting vile substances. These tropes have been copied ever since, principally by pale imitators corresponding to The Satan Inside, Ship Us From Evil, The Final Exorcism, and The Exorcism of Emily Rose.
Curiously, The Exorcist sequels have largely averted that acquainted path. After the primary movie’s colossal, Oscar-winning success, Exorcist II: The Heretic was launched in 1977, helmed by one other esteemed director (John Boorman). Nevertheless it was critically derided on the time partly due to how a lot it deviated from expectations. That movie is about African environmental politics and machines that hyperlink folks’s mind waves, and contains a psychic battle with the satan within the type of a locust swarm. Although typically baffling, it’s an admirably uncommon work that defies simple stereotyping and is now beloved by some (Martin Scorsese has stated that he prefers it to the unique).
The 1990 movie The Exorcist III tried to hew nearer to the unique by bringing in William Peter Blatty as author and director. Blatty had written the unique Exorcist novel and the screenplay for the movie adaptation, and for this sequel, he tailored a distinct ebook of his, the serial-killer drama Legion. The Exorcist III features as a hard-boiled cop drama with supernatural overtones, a hunt for a Zodiac-esque serial killer the place the satan himself may be concerned. Then, in 2004, Paul Schrader was employed to direct a prequel to the primary film, however the studio was unhappy along with his ruminative work and shot a brand new model directed by Renny Harlin, known as Exorcist: The Starting. That movie features principally as a spiritual motion film, with the priest Lankester Merrin (performed by Stellan Skarsgård) doing battle with the satan in Forties Cairo. It was so poorly acquired that the studio finally relented and put out Schrader’s accomplished model, titled Dominion: Prequel to the Exorcist—a much more attention-grabbing (although slower-paced) tackle the identical character and setting.
There’s a great purpose every sequel didn’t attempt to replicate the drama of The Exorcist, which regardless of many makes an attempt stays inimitable. It’s largely a testomony to an almost-50-year-old film that The Exorcist: Believer delivers so few correct scares, even with an intensive modern-CGI finances and the enthusiastic help of its studio, Common, which spent $400 million on the rights and was planning a movie trilogy. There’s not one of the shock of the unique, as a result of the 2 possessed ladies are given make-up jobs much like that of Regan MacNeil (Linda Blair) within the first film. After so many copycats and parodies, seeing them grunt profanities and hover within the air not feels transgressive.
It’d assist if the story had a compelling emotional basis, however the backstory for stricken dad Victor Fielding (Leslie Odom Jr.) and his daughter, Angela (Lidya Jewett), is the paint-by-numbers tragedy of Angela dropping her mom at delivery. The inclusion of Burstyn’s character Chris MacNeil, Regan’s mom, feels meaningless, a tether to the unique Exorcist that exists largely to verify that, sure, Angela and her good friend Katherine are possessed and, no, fashionable medication gained’t save them. The Exorcist: Believer brushes up towards an attention-grabbing notion—this time, the Catholic Church refuses to approve an official exorcism, citing considerations over the protection of the process. However the finish consequence shouldn’t be a lot completely different; it’s nonetheless a bunch of adults standing in a room yelling prayers and exhortations at possessed ladies.
If two sequels are actually deliberate to observe The Exorcist: Believer, Inexperienced and his producing companions (together with the horror mega-mogul Jason Blum) could be clever to return to the earlier method to Exorcist sequels. Taking the notion of demonic possession and dropping it into different genres or narrative sorts may have extra daring outcomes. One other back-to-basics film like this one would inevitably really feel painfully spinoff, as if cowering within the enormous shadow nonetheless forged by Friedkin’s masterwork.
