The forefather of demon-possession horror, the legacy of William Friedkin's lucrative and trend-setting THE EXORCIST is insurmountable. It sets a bar so high that everything follows it is either derivative or inferior, or definitely both.
A preamble set in an archeological site in Iraq, Father Lankester Merrin (von Sydow) alights on a sculpture of the demon Pazuzu, which would later possess in the body of a twelve-year-old girl Regan (Blair) in Georgetown, Washington DC , without particular reason, you can call it bad luck, purely
But Father Merrin would only re-enter the picture in the final exorcism sequences, before that, Friedkin's picture is occupied in bifurcating story-lines, one details Regan's deterioration and the coping strategy of her mother Chris MacNeil (Burstyn), whose initial puzzlement, doubt and dread would eventually gel into crying despair. The other is about a Catholic Father Damien Karras (Miller), who is steeped in his own person crisis after the decease of his Greek mother (Maliaros), he is a clerical man on the brink of losing his faith. When Father Karras is recommended to Chris as a last resort to cure Regan's possession with exorcism, from his own dispirited state, premonition is difficult to dispel, even with the succor of the senior Father Merrin, it is a fighting chance .
As a horror picture, scary factor is a salient index to indicate how the film works or not, and Friedkins' genius lies in that he is not a cheap trickster, no jump scare editing or swelling, ominous aural effects are tapped, since unalloyed is a bête noire in filmmaking (for radical sadists only!). Instead, he relies on the special effect, makeup and stunt departments to reify Regan's physical transmutation (that spider-walk ambulation!) and voice alteration (the possessed Regan's demonic utterance is from a fire-breathing Mercedes McCambridge), so that audience can feel the fright simultaneously with a giggling frisson, which also signifies a solid cast is a requisite.
Burstyn is great as a concerned, fraught, desperate mother, but also has that celebrity swagger (she plays a well-known actress), her Chris is anything but a soft touch. As a single-mother rearing her daughter in the only way she knows and she is punished, but for what, her inadequacy? the lack of a father figure in Regan's upbringing? While those quibbles may betray author William Peter Blatty's own slanted view about woman, Burstyn countervails such veiled sexist sallies with confidence and poise, even in her most vulnerable and distressed moment, she doesn't fail either as a mother or a woman. She is the kind mother who will do anything to save her daughter, but not without a lucid mind, she knows when Regan is overpowered by the demon, and that is NOT her daughter! A tenet many of THE EXORCISTS' emulators do not heed.
While Miller is well-cast in his first screen role, his Father Karras is such a defeatist who desperately needs a hug, and von Sydow has ample charisma and gravitas (even without the aging make-up treatment) to spare, it is Blair's unprecedented incarnation of an evil spirit that leaves an indelible scar (though objectively, one should appraise her performance without the spine-tingling voice work). Physically, the role looks like such an arduous task for any 12-year-older, and Blair asserts herself strenuously and wholesomely, she is particularly effective when her Regan is undergone veristic medical operations.
Rigorously parsing the ever-so entangled conflict between science and religion (Father Karras is both a psychiatrist and a priest) and tellingly foregrounding the omnipresent guilt that torments every and each Catholic soul, THE EXORCIST still retains its topicality and extraordinary technical craftsmanship, though it is not seminally frightening after all these decades' progression of scare-fest, to Yours Truly, an after-image of delirium is just what the doctor ordered.
referential entries: Friedkin's CRUISING (1980, 7.4/10); Roman Polanski's ROSEMARY'S BABY (1968, 7.4/10).
Title: The Exorcist
Year: 1973
Country: USA
Language: English, Latin, Greek, French, German, Arabic, Kurdish
Genre: Horror
Director: William Friedkin
Screenwriter: William Peter Blatty, based on his own novel
Cinematography: Owen Roizman
Music: Jack Nitzsche
Editing: Norman Gay, Evan A. Lottman
Cast:
Ellen Burstyn
Jason Miller
Linda Blair
Max von Sydow
Lee J. Cobb
Kitty Winn
Jack MacGowran
William O'Malley
Barton Heyman
Rudolf Schündler
Titos Vandis
Vasiliki Maliaros
Arthur Storch
Robert Symonds
Peter Masterson
Mercedes McCambridge
Rating: 8.0/10
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