The Exorcist: It's Fine, But Far From Brilliant

Rating: 8/10 (17 March 2010)

Regularly labelled as the scariest film of all time, and considered by many to be the best, the infamous stories surrounding the release of The Exorcist and the reactions of its audiences ensure an impressive reputation precedes the viewing of this classic.
Concerning 12 year old Regan MacNeil, the film details her possession at the hands of the demon Pazuzu. After the subsequent psychiatric and medical treatments prove useless, her mother arranges an exorcism, hiring two priests to drive the demon from her daughter's body.
With such a reputation, I was either going to be disappointed, or discover a film I would love. Sadly, the former was the case. Good performances compliment the film, an interesting concept and storyline give it a solid foundation, but it just turned out to be overrated. It features an interesting and compelling theme, and one I see most effectively in the character of Father Karras. His was the plot line I was most interested in, and one which I feel was particularly well developed, Jason Miller giving a wonderfully stoic depth of emotion to his character. In the end, I certainly enjoyed the film, but it was nothing to the reputation it enjoys. Certain scenes seemed rather unnecessarily violent and inappropriate and included simply for the shock value, detracting from the film's effect and making me question its true intentions. It may be the case that the film has not aged particularly well, and I do wish I had seen it on its initial release, but as I did see it, it did little for me beyond a standard quantity of entertainment.
The Exorcist supports itself for its running time, its thematic shadow lingering throughout. Father Karras is the film's best facet, but he's not enough in himself, leaving the film somewhat unbalanced. In short, it's fine, but far from brilliant.