The Exorcist - A personal perspective.

Rating: 10/10 (15 September 2008)

I was eight years old when The Exorcist came out. The stories in the playground started almost immediately, about parents throwing up in the cinema or of ambulances being called out to distraught patrons every night. I was into horror films already thanks to Hammer and Universal. My bedroom walls were adorned with pictures and posters of Cushing, Karloff and Lee and my younger sister was too scared to ever venture into my bedroom. So, of course, I wanted to see The Exorcist desperately. I read about it at every opportunity in magazines such as World Of Horror or Monster Mag. But in those pre-video/DVD years I had to wait until I was old enough. When I was sixteen I had a friend a few years older than me, Jim. He was an adopted orphan after his parents were killed in a car crash and paraplegic, paralysed from the waist down after a pole vaulting accident when he was thirteen. He had seen The Exorcist and told me it didn't live up to the hype and was 'nothing special'. Eventually, when Exorcist 2:The Heretic came out it was being shown close to me in a double bill with The Exorcist. After much perseverance I eventually persuaded Jim to accompany me to see it. For some reason they showed Exorcist 2 first and I started to fear the worst, was this any indication of what the Exorcist was like? I needn't have worried. The Exorcist blew me away and when my friend and I emerged from the cinema, into the cold night, he eventually admitted to me that the real reason he didn't want to see it again was because it had terrified him that much that he hadn't slept for weeks. I felt guilty for dragging him to see it again. Years later we watched it again on video for old times sake. Not long after this Jim committed suicide with no warning or indication. I miss him and every time I watch The Exorcist I think of him. So apart from being one of the best films ever made it also holds a special place in my heart.