Georgetown, Washington D.C. Actress and divorced mother Chris MacNeil starts to experience ‘difficulties’ with her usually sweet-natured eleven-year-old daughter Regan. The child becomes afflicted by spasms, convulsions, and unsettling amnesiac episodes; these abruptly worsen into violent fits of appalling foul-mouthed curses, accompanied by physical mutation. Medical science is baffled by Regan’s plight and, in her increasing despair, Chris turns to troubled priest and psychiatrist Damien Karras, who immediately recognizes something profoundly malevolent in Regan’s distorted features and speech. On Karras’s recommendation, the Church summons Father Merrin, a specialist in the exorcism of demons . . .
Horror Book Review Blog: The Exorcist
I was not yet born in 1973 when The Exorcist was unleashed in cinemas in the United States. No, I must have been in my teens in the 90s when I first saw the famed film. I knew all about it, yet, I did not dedicate time to watching it. My parents always boasted about having watched it themselves when they were teenagers. Well, my dad at least. My mom was too scared to watch it. That right there was already a positive review in my opinion.
As a teen, I considered myself to be more religious than I am now. I was what I would consider, a believer. I grew up going to catholic school all my life so, yes, I think talk of the father, the son, and the holy ghost was drilled into my head that it inflicted a type of fear that any catholic could understand. The fear of satan, the devil, himself. The Exorcist was, at the time, billed as “the scariest movie of all time.” Heck, to this day, many still consider this to be true. After finally watching the film, it left me with a feeling of unease. So many questions swirled around my young mind: Can this really happen? Am I religious enough to repel any threats from demons? Why didn’t I watch this film sooner?
It has been many years now since I last saw the movie but, now, with the recent release of The Exorcist: Believer, it has rekindled my interest in the franchise. While, currently, I have no interest in watching the new installment, it piqued my curiosity to read the source material of the original film, the novel of the same name by William Peter Blatty. It is a book I was always interested in reading but having watched the film I never really considered reading the novel. However, I wanted to give it a go and I am glad I did.
Again, the film, while it can be disturbing, and even scary considering the time of its release, especially to those who are deeply religious, can be deemed by some to be quite a slow burn or even funny. Of course, that is not to say that this facet makes it bad, but those who want things to happen immediately will be sorely disappointed. In today’s day and age where everything is instant, slow burns can test one’s patience. I grew up in a time where I had to sit through five minutes of commercials before returning to “my regularly scheduled programming” or, worse, wait an entire week before catching the next episode of my favorite TV show. If I missed it, I had to scour through the TV guide until I found out when that program would be repeated. Oftentimes, it was repeated after hours. William Peter Blatty’s book, The Exorcist, can be deemed the same way, a slow burn. I’d liken it to a massive buildup to the conclusive climax we are so familiar with.
In my opinion, the film version compared to the novel is actually fast-paced. This is not surprising being that usually many aspects from a book to screen adaptation have to be cut for timing purposes or, as in the case of The Shining, the director thinks his vision is better. The Exorcist had the fortune of having the novel’s author, Blatty, also write the screenplay for the film. So, while some things were sacrificed, for the most part, the integrity of the novel was intact.
“More rooted in logic was the silence of God. In the world there was evil and much of it resulted from doubt, from an honest confusion among men of good will. Would a reasonable God refuse to end it? Not finally reveal Himself? Not speak?”
– William Peter Blatty, The Exorcist
While the film had an air of a detective mystery, this aspect was more prominent in the book where red herrings were presented and the investigation went deeper and uncovered more character backgrounds and truths. In the end, none of this side story mattered to get to the crux of the story, however, it expanded on the happenings within the narrative if you knew nothing of the story. Being familiar with the story does not help because you know where it is going and the truths that will come to light later.
Both the novel and William Friedkin’s film of the same name are both excellent albeit ever so slightly different. What you get in the novel are the inner thoughts and feelings of our characters that help to build on their motivations and traits. We see in the film the struggles of Father Damien Karras in the film which are helped by Jason Miller’s performance as well as Friedkin’s direction, but the novel explores this further and is not compromised by a film’s runtime. In essence, the film is a condensed version of the book, even though the film is two hours long. Watching the film after finishing the book I got a real sense of how the book was able to build up the suspense leading up to the climactic finale.
William Peter Blatty’s The Exorcist is a frightening novel that covers both a scientific and religious perspective where exorcism is only considered as a last resort. The writing, in my opinion, was excellent and a fairly easy read. It is a book that could only wish to be able to read before the film was released back in ’73 to have the full experience of the story without already what was to come. Being able to read it this way would have been an absolute delight. The not knowing, the questions of whether or not what was happening was real or not were all there but, because The Exorcist has been indoctrinated into pop culture anyone with a television or the internet knows well the end result. Oh, and the infamous line that we all know too well, “The power of Christ compels you!” Not once are those words uttered in the novel.