Review

Well this will be the third time I get down and dirty doing the plot outline for this one, so to save time I'm going to be as brief as a pair of French knickers. Twelve year old Regan is possessed by a demonic entity and starts doing contortions, swearing like a League supporter, and having breath that no amount of mouth wash is going to fix. Regan's mom Chris tries the Doctors, who fail to resolve the situation and then calls in the Priests.

Father Karras and Father Merrin combat an ancient evil, shenanigans happen, and we are wondering if anyone is going to survive the ordeal. Hampering the movie is Father Dryer, a bit character, and Detective Kinderman walking into the sunset cause that's how the book finished and stuff. Ready to check out the Script writer's cut?

There was apparently some dispute back in 1973 about which cut of The Exorcist should be unleashed on the public. Director Friedkin's version was the one that arrived in cinemas at the time but script writer Blatty preferred another version. Finally in 2000 we got the version Blatty wanted released back in 1973 and we finally had a chance to compare both movies. I'm not going to retread old ground in this review; I'm going to pass on a personal weird moment with The Exorcist and then discuss what we got in the long anticipated new version.

I'm somewhat confused about which year I originally saw The Exorcist in. I was way too young in 1973 to have caught the movie yet am sure I saw it in the theatre and the movie was on first release in New Zealand. Did it get released a decade after 1973? Recently I ran into an old friend, who was one of the three of us who caught the movie one wet and rainy Saturday night, and over a couple of beers mentioned the movie and asked whether or not he remembered what year we saw it. We both agreed we saw it in our home town prior to heading off to separate Cities and different lives, but we would have seen it well after the movie's initial release. My friend even went so far as to contact the cinema we saw it in and found out they had only ever shown it during the winter in 1973. Anyways, and I still remain confused about when we saw it, The Exorcist proved to be a defining moment for me. I had nightmares for a week or so after watching the movie but in the process became a huge fan of the horror genre. Moving along here, sorry for the personal interlude.

Blatty's version of The Exorcist starts with a scene cut from the original release. It's not titled carded so I have no idea where the scene is meant to be, I'm assuming where talking Georgetown. Anyways we have a street scape and then cut to Northern Iraq and Merrin's epiphany about what waits in his future. There's simply no reason for the first scene, it does nothing and advances the plot in no fashion what so ever, the only thing I can think of is maybe a comparison between Georgetown, Merrin's future, and Northern Iraq, Merrin's present.

A classic of the genre that puts about every mainstream Hollywood horror release to shame

While there are a few additional scenes in the movie, including the infamous spider-walk, the biggest change to the movie is additional frames in some scenes that were cut from the original cinema release. The additional frames actually improve the flow of the movie and pad out details that were skimmed over in the original release of the movie. There seems to be a better pace and narrative to the new version that had me humming along to what I was seeing on my screen.

So everyone wants to know about the additional scenes, and yes they are peppered throughout the movie. Besides the opening scene, which for mine was well past redundant, we get extend scenes of Regan in various medical facilities, overall they don't add much except for one scene where a nurse is watching Regan, that was actually quite effective. The "spider-walk" scene simply didn't work for me, it was a quick insertion that really served no purpose and disrupted the narrative flow. I was in a JB HiFi store where they were playing a copy of Twilight during that movie's first week in release on DVD, there was one scene in that movie which lead to everyone in the store bursting into laughter, the scene where Shovel face is racing through the forest with Vanilla in his arms, legs don't fail me now! I had a similar reaction to the spider-walk, it wasn't scary it was amusing. There's a number of other additional scenes that do work, an eerie glimpse of Regan as an old lady, the demonic face, etc but the final scene of Dryer and Kinderman walking into the sunset simply destroyed The Exorcist for me. It was a hopeless tag on that served no valid purpose beyond showing how the source novel finished.

Guess that about covers it, the original movie is extended by a bunch of new scenes and extended frames at vital times. While I did enjoy some of this I'm not entirely sure the new version deserves much in the way of accolades, the cinematic version is solid enough making the 2000 version redundant for mine. A movie for hard core fans of The Exorcist only, recommended to those folk but not to the general public. I would love to see another Editor have a go at this movie; suggest they remove some of the scenes for a more solid narrative flow, just a thought.