The exorcist 2 the heretic
The script kept churning as filming started, and this turned into reshoots and delays and Boorman and two of the actress falling ill and the first editor quitting mid-production and … Goodhart refused, so Boorman and his creative associate (and future Excalibur screenwriter) Rospo Pallenberg took on the rewrites. Although the idea of Goodhart’s ideas excited Boorman, he apparently didn’t like the actual script and pushed for Goodhart to rewrite it. It does a bit of retconning, but it offers a global challenge, a counter-argument to evil, and it could make for an epic horror film. It’s almost a superhero story, but without upending what made Exorcist popular. The new story features a priest who, while investigating the possible heretical ideas of Father Merrin and its connections to Regan’s exorcism, comes to realize the importance of this network of healers.
THE EXORCIST 2 THE HERETIC FREE
Father Merrin’s battle with the demon who possessed Regan in The Exorcist was a fight to free one of these healing souls from the clutches of an evil force that wanted to destroy this emerging power for good. He is a “heretic” who developed notions about ESP and people who appear to be born healers across the world. Father Merrin, the exorcist of the original film, also takes the part of the subtitle of this film. Based on what initially interested Boorman and what ended up on screen, I think I can hazard a guess.
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Goodhart’s script underwent numerous rewrites, so it isn’t easy to assess what the original screenplay was like. Boorman was also coming off the box-office disappointment of Zardoz (1974) and perhaps thought Exorcist II would be an easy financial success and he could fund the King Arthur picture he’d been dreaming about for twenty years. The sequel script intrigued him with its notion of “goodness” as the driving force. They offered the picture to English director John Boorman, who had turned down directing The Exorcist years before because he thought it was cruel to children.
THE EXORCIST 2 THE HERETIC MOVIE
reputedly threw half a million dollars at them just to try to think up something over lunch.Īfter ditching the concept of making an ultra-cheap sequel recycling unused footage and angles from the first movie with a framing device (that would’ve been irredeemably awful) the studio got a script they liked from William Goodhart, a Broadway playwright interested in metaphysics and theology. But original director William Friedkin and author William Peter Blatty couldn’t develop any idea they liked to lure them back for a follow-up. was not going to turn down a chance to pick up more box-office cash. The 1973 film was the highest-grossing motion picture in history at the time of release, and Warner Bros. This is an issue, as you might imagine.Ī sequel to The Exorcist was inevitable. The movie is also not remotely scary, so the “horror” aspect that made the first film such a smash hit is missing.
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The metaphysical gropings of the story cannot overcome the many thundering moments “What the … ?” splattering against the screen like locusts on the side of a Dust Bowl barn. I can see what John Boorman was trying to achieve beneath the haze of everything that doesn’t work, and it was a laudable goal.īut if not a complete failure, Exorcist II is primarily a failure. But it remains beguiling and intriguing: an ambitious piece sunk by a combination of overreach and production nightmares. There isn’t any negative leveled at the movie I consider inaccurate. Most of what critics consider wrong with it are indeed serious problems.
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I don’t think it’s right to call Exorcist II a misunderstood work. It’s no surprise audiences in 1977 laughed it off the screen. It’s also weirdly off-kilter, unevenly acted and scripted, and edited on a bad glue-sniffing trip. Exorcist II: The Heretic contains fascinating ideas, wonderful visual moments, and an excellent score.
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Maybe Boorman failed to execute the material, but the movie still deserved better than it got.” Genre critic and historian Kim Newman acknowledges the film isn’t a success but that it does manage to be interesting. Martin Scorsese has expressed admiration for the film: “I like the first Exorcist, because of the Catholic guilt I have, and because it scared the hell out of me but The Heretic surpasses it. But lying like an oily stain in the middle of his career is the 1977 box-office disaster and audience-loathed sequel, Exorcist II: The Heretic. John Boorman has directed a number of classics, including three personal favorites: Point Blank (1967), Deliverance (1972), and Excalibur (1981). This article is reworked from a 2013 post. Happy October! I’m resurrecting horror movie articles from my old blog and revamping them.