Article by Jake Billingsley
William Friedkin’s The Exorcist is the third film in Marcus Wehrenberg Theatre’s Friday night scare series. The film will be shown October 19-21, and there will be one screening each night at 10 PM. Admission is only $5. For more details and a list of participating theaters, go HERE
William Peter Blatty’s novel, The Exorcist, served William Friedkin a beacon of horror opportunity that still shines 44 years later. Blatty’s 1971 novel displays the exorcism of Roland Doe, a pseudonym for a boy, which happened in St. Louis. Friedkin adapts the film nearly two years later with Blatty’s screenplay. However, The Exorcist isn’t Friedkin’s first great film. He won the Academy Award for Best Picture the previous year for The French Connection. The Exorcist is the film he is most remembered for; Friedkin gets another Best Picture nomination, the first for a horror film, but doesn’t win. A horror film getting a Best Picture nomination is unheard of today, let alone 44 years ago. The Exorcist is considered by many to be the greatest horror film ever made. This opinion seems to be dwindling amongst recent generations. The younger moviegoers have argued that Friedkin’s film doesn’t hold up today; I disagree.
With the recent success of It, The Exorcist has finally been dethroned from the top box office spot inside the horror genre. The Exorcist grossed an international high at just over $440 million in 1973, and Stephen King’s novel adaptation has made $630 million worldwide. While inflation isn’t factored into the comparison between the two, there is still impressive box office numbers coming in for horror films today. People are never going to get tired of being scared. Friedkin once said, “People only go to movies for three reasons, to laugh, cry, or be frightened.” He followed that with, “There are only three reasons to make a movie, to make people laugh, to make them cry, or to frighten them.” The Exorcist will make some laugh today, but I will wager in the direction of the tears and fears that have plagued moviegoers for over four decades.
So what is different about Friedkin’s masterwork? Like It, The Exorcist was a film that audiences flocked to. The difference is that nowadays we know what we are getting, but many moviegoers in 1973 didn’t know what they were getting into. The Exorcist is a film that exploits a different style of filmmaking; this is true for the horror genre in particular. Friedkin adopts a documentarian approach to this film, and that’s why the movie is traumatically memorable. Do we care about Regan as she progresses into her devilish state? Do we care about what happens to the priests in the end? Do we care about the characters at all or are we hypnotized by the horrific events that take place? This film is a spiritual character study that brings us to the common recognition of how evil our world can be. It is hard to feel an emotional connection to subject matter that is so dark. All you have to do is sit back and watch. The film will take care of the rest.
