When my husband asked me what I was watching, I said, “The Exorcism starring Russell Crowe.” Him: “Didn’t that already come out?” Me: “That was The Pope’s Exorcist (2023). He is doing all exorcism movies now.”
I will admit, I did not see The Pope’s Exorcist, so I can’t compare Russell Crowe’s exorcism movies. But The Exorcism is fine. It’s an average movie, with enough thrills to entertain the horror fans, but with a story that felt overpacked. It felt like the movie was trying to do too many things.
The Exorcism opens with the death of an actor, as he goes over his scene while walking through the set. The lights suddenly go out, there are cries coming from behind a door, and invisible hands crumple the man’s throat.
We then meet Anthony Miller (Crowe), a washed up actor trying to get back into the game. He is auditioning to play a priest (the role vacated by the actor who died) in The Georgetown Project, a thinly veiled remake of The Exorcist. Anthony has problems — all the problems. As a child, he was molested during his five years as an altar boy in the Catholic church. He has, unsurprisingly, lost his faith. But things haven’t gotten better for him. His wife died of cancer; he became an alcoholic, and that led to drugs, which led to a lengthy stint in rehab. This has virtually destroyed his relationship with his 16-year-old daughter, Lee (Ryan Simpkins), who has recently been expelled from her boarding school.
Anthony gets the role, and gets his daughter a production-assistant gig on the film. On the first day of shooting, Anthony gets a nosebleed and that night, after work, Lee discovers him sleepwalking. The second day of the shoot, the director lays into Anthony for not digging into the role, and then is almost killed by a falling light. Things only get worse from there, though it (The curse? The demon?) seems to leave the crew alone – it is mostly just Anthony, whose issues affect him both on set (like when he folds in half, backwards) and at home (where he is acting increasingly strange, scaring Lee with his sleepwalking and hiding in her room).
On the surface, The Exorcism seems like a dramatized telling of the weird events that happened on The Exorcist. But when you actually watch the film, it is a messy combination between that, working through trauma, and a demon taking over a deeply unwell man. Ultimately, I don’t know what the real cause of the trouble is. It could be that the role was cursed. It could be that Anthony himself was cursed. It could be that the movie itself was cursed. There was so much going on, and nothing seemed to point specifically at one thing or another.
I had a few logistical issues in the third act that I don’t want to talk about because it is a huge spoiler. And I wasn’t thrilled with the pro-religion message the film seemed to deliver. Despite all this, there were definitely some good thrills, plenty of screaming-demon stuff, and even a jump scare that got me (and I am notoriously impossible to scare).
The Exorcism is an average film. If you are looking for some cheap thrills, give it a shot. If you are looking for a legitimate exorcism film, go see The Exorcist (1973).
