In 1949, a strange discovery has been unearthed in East Africa.
An ancient Christian church, dating from the fifth century, has been discovered
buried in the earth. But the really odd thing is that while the Byzantine Empire
had adopted Christianity at that time, they never made it this far south.
Lancaster Merrin (well-played by Stellan Skarsgård), a former Catholic priest who is now an archeologist, has been
hired by a collector of ancient relics to head to the site and bring back
whatever exotic artifacts he can find.
Once he arrives at the dig, Merrin begins to uncover some strange stuff, and
it's not relics. For one thing, the church, which has been buried under the
earth, is in marvelous condition (at least on the exterior). And the native
workers at the site will not enter the church because of the presence of evil
spirits. The former head archeologist of the expedition had gone insane. And
when Merrin enters the church with Father Francis, they see that instead of
exalting heaven, this church appears to cast its gaze downward. All of the
statues of warrior angels are posed with their weapons aimed right at the ground.
And pretty soon, the cross on the wall of Father Francis' quarters flips
upside-down, a pack of glowing-eyed hyenas are on the prowl, and a local boy
named Joseph is acting downright creepy.
It's enough to make your head spin.
As it's title implies, Exorcist: The Beginning tries to be a prequel to The
Exorcist by focusing on Father Merrin, who was played in the original 1973 film
by Max von Sydow. The main problem with Exorcist: The Beginning is that too often director Renny
Harlan goes for the cheap scare. Birds abruptly fly out from nowhere, and a
shadowy figure in the dark turns out to be one of the site workers. It's the
sort of annoying trick that bad slasher movies always use: something black and ominous
leaps out at the hero…oh never mind, it's just the cat! And yet when the real
demonic mumbo-jumbo finally heats up in Exorcist, it turns out to be just stale
leftovers from the original film--whose director, William Friedkin, handled the
putrid proceedings with far more style and flair than Harlan, who only manages
to disgust his viewers rather than frighten them.
The ironic thing is that this film is actually a remake. Director Paul Schrader
(the 1982 Cat People) originally shot a less gory and more cerebral take on the
story. But the film's producers, along with the studio, deemed Schrader's film
to be "not good enough". And so it was shelved and Harlan was hired to put the
same cast of actors through their paces in this story, which is loaded to the
gills with blood and gore and dead maggot-ridden babies. But the only thing that
Exorcist: The Beginning truly inspires is a desire to see Schrader's version,
which can't be as bad as this (even more ironically, the Schrader version of
Exorcist: The Beginning has since been released in theaters, and will soon hit
home video). The slim special features on the DVD include an audio commentary by
the director, cliff notes on the cast and crew, and a skimpy, making of
documentary. After watching Exorcist: The Beginning, you might want to throw the
original Exorcist on, just so it will exorcise the bad taste from your DVD
player.
--SF
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