THE EXORCIST: BELIEVER – Review

So October has finally arrived and the studios are truly “bringing out the big guns” in order to “scare up” some box office bucks at the ole’ haunted multiplex. We’re talking the “classics” here. No, it’s not another SCREAM entry, since this one goes back a lot further in fear film history. Not as far as the “thirsty Count” since we’ve had two flicks about the true first “bat-man” in the past year. But it is older than the HALLOWEEN (the crew behind the last three are behind this one) series or the assorted other sinister stalkers. We can call this a fright franchise since there have been four (some say five) entries and even a short-lived TV series. And it all started exactly fifty years ago as a best-selling novel was adapted into what was then the most profitable horror movie ever (for at least a couple of years). Talk about a “hard act” to follow! That’s the daunting task ahead for this “reimagining” titled THE EXORCIST: BELIEVER.

It begins, much like the original did, with a flashback in an exotic foreign land. Victor Fielding (Leslie Odom Jr.) is enjoying a vacation in Haiti with his very pregnant wife Sorenne (Tracey Graves) thirteen (oh oh) years ago. He’s indulging his passion for photography when they’re separated by a devasting earthquake, which leads to a tragic decision. Flash forward to today as Victor shares a home in a small Georgia town with his daughter Angela (Lidya Jewett), who is curious about her mother. Luckily she’s made many friends in school, particularly Katherine (Olivia Marcum). One day they each toss out fibs about studying at each others’ houses to their folks. Instead, the duo explores a nearby wooded area to light a candle and attempt to communicate with the “spirit world” (maybe Angela’s mum will answer her queries). Hours pass, darkness falls, and Victor starts to panic. He reaches out to Katherine’s folks, who think she’s with Angela. The panicked parents meet at the police station where the very religious Miranda (Jennifer Nettles) and Tony (Norbert Leo Butz) eye Victor with suspicion. Soon the trio are covering the town with missing flyers. Amazingly the girls turn up alive three days later, thirty miles away. They get a clean bill of health at the local hospital despite some odd scars on the feet and legs. And then the truly freaky behavior begins, as the duo begins to speak in low guttural voices and lash out violently. Victor starts to consider admitting Angela into a mental health facility until his neighbor, a local nurse named Ann (Ann Dowd) gives him a copy of a book written by a woman claiming that her daughter was possessed by a demon. After checking out some online interviews, Victor visits the author, former actress Chris MacNeill (Ellen Burstyn). She agrees to observe Angela, but can her knowledge and experience end the living nightmare of the parents and save their daughters?

Serving as the film’s anchor which strains to hold the disparate plot twists and turns is the talented Mr. Odom Jr. as everyman Victor. We first see him as a loving husband and later father who must not allow fear and panic to overwhelm him. We see that determination on Odom Jr’s face and a hint of desperation in his eyes. It’s then that he shifts into hero mode to rescue his precious daughter. In that role, Ms. Jewitt is quite endearing as the sweet, but often exasperating Angela as she peers into memories of that past which her father doesn’t wish to relive. Plus, she’s very creepy after her “return’, much like Ms. Marcum, who has a bright mischievous smile while disrupting class before morphing into a wild feral creature who terrorizes an entire church. Nettles is quite compelling as her devoted mama, while Butz is manic and boisterous as her “wildcard” papa. Ms. Dowd brings much gravitas and poignancy to the role of the neighborhood “nudge” (“Take in those trash cans!”) turned demon-fighter. Kudos also to Raphael Sbarge as Katherine’s Baptist pastor who eschews the usual cliche of the greedy mega-church huckster. But the film’s MVP is probably the franchise return of Burstyn who commands the screen as the haunted, but still fiery Ms. MacNeill, who is eager to join the battle despite her years, perhaps to release her from some half-a-century-old anguish.

Horror vet (the final HALLOWEEN trilogy) David Gordon Green takes over the directing reigns working from the script he co-wrote with Peter Sattler, Danny Mcbride, and Scott Teems. For the film’s first half, he keeps the pace flowing while setting up the creepy undercurrents of small-town America. Unfortunately, the specter of the 1973 original looms large, pushing him to try and emulate the quick editing unnerving image sequences of that iconic work. Green tries to temper this with more modern “jump scares”, which are offset by the loopy “set-ups” (Victor is barely slowed down when coming through the unlocked front door of his home). And did we really need the nast sequences at a homeless shelter or at a home for the mentally ill (shades of THE SNAKE PIT)? Speaking of modern, we get plenty of the current genre’s penchant for cruelty, especially with a pivotal scene involving MacNeill, that’s is so mean-spirited it pushes the boundaries of good taste for this much-maligned genre. But at least she’s not part of the final act “face-off’ in which a multi-faith Avengers-style team uses each of their religion’s teachings to battle the two possessed pre-teens sporting all manner of CGI-enhanced makeup prosthetics (Katherine sports a Frankenstein-like forehead while Angela harkens back to the 70’s grindhouse classic shocker ABBEY). All the chaos and pummeling sound and fury lead to a limp finale and a bland epilogue, even though a late “arrival” is somewhat charming. The folks at Blumhouse can’t quite work their monster magic on this familiar property, making THE EXORCIST: BELIEVER a reboot with no real “kick”, and only a smattering of those “Tubular Bells”.

1.5 Out of 4

THE EXORCIST: BELIEVER is now playing in theatres everywhere