One of the truly Great love stories...

Rating: 10/10 (28 May 2013)

Sure, it scared the bejeezus outta me when I was a kid (I literally couldn't close my eyes that night without seeing THAT FACE or hearing THAT VOICE), but one of the things I've always found most interesting about THE EXORCIST is that it's one of the truly great love stories. Father Karras sacrifices himself in the end out of love. His doubts about his religious beliefs aside, the ending proves that the man hasn't lost his innate love of Humanity: he's willing to trade HIS life for the girl's. In a fright film as powerful as this one, that's one hell of an affirmation. The re-release, which contained the previously excised "spider" scene, was well worth seeing (though I still can't figure out why it was cut in the first place): it's hands down one of the scariest things I've ever seen; the sound effects alone were worth the price of admission. Unlike the re-edited versions of THE WARRIORS (in which Walter Hill totally ruins the break-neck pace of the movie) or THE OUTSIDERS (in which Copolla drowns out the drama with gratuitous music) or BLADE RUNNER (in seven re-edits of which Ridley Scott makes not one substantial change) or APOCALYPSE NOW (which was edited right the first time) or JAWS (in which Spielberg has Scheider as Brody idiotically saying "Blow up!" as the shark makes its final charge) or STAR WARS (in which George Lucas mistakenly thought that making Han Solo faster than a speeding bullet was a good idea- which completely undercut the character's character) or any one of a number of other "re-dos," the restored version of THE EXORCIST IS worth a look.