Because Hallowe'en is less than a week away, I feel compelled to visit the horror genre again. But there's more to this week's cinematic "sermon" than the fact that it's a horror film. I'll even go so far as it to call it THE horror film. It's certainly the scariest movie I've ever seen. But I have a weird, personal connection to this week's film--or at the very least, I have a weird, personal connection to the book on which it was based. In many ways, it's actually an odd (really odd) love letter to my mother.
Mom was a serious reader. She was never happier than when she had her nose buried in a book. She loved all kinds of literature, but she was particularly fond of historical fiction, historical nonfiction, and romance. She even later became the librarian in my hometown. A few years back, my friend Brad sent me a picture of her reading to his kids. As he pointed out, Mom was the librarian to four generations of his family. (FUN FACT: His mother was my high school librarian.)
On the night of 17 April, 1974, my very pregnant mother was at my paternal grandparents' house. According to her, she was reading William Peter Blatty's novel The Exorcist, which had recently been made into a movie that had been released the previous December. As someone who was not really a fan of scary movies and believed that the book was always better than the movie (or at least she believed that before The Bridges of Madison County was released), I'm guessing she opted to read the book before--or, more likely, instead of--seeing the film. While reading the book, she went into labour with me. Gramps drove her to the hospital, Grandma called Dad on the other end of the state, and I was born on the morning of 19 April.
Like most people who grew up at that time, I knew The Exorcist primarily as that scary movie that my parents wouldn't let me watch. There was a girl who could turn her head all the way around and spit pea soup at people. There was a bed that levitated. The things in the film had been talked about so much that when I saw Richard Pryor in the "SNL" sketch "The Exorcist II," I got the jokes even though I'd never seen the film. ("The bed must be on the floor. The bed must be on the floor." THUD! "The bed is on my foot. The bed is on my foot...")
I first saw The Exorcist when I was 23 years old. My surrogate brother, Rindt, had a VHS copy of the film which he loaned to me. I thought it was a really good movie. It had the proper balance of shocking, scary, and creepy. I can understand why a lot of people were freaked out by it. It made me jump once or twice. But beyond that I didn't really give it much thought. Just because I'm naturally drawn to comedy, I think I was more taken with the film version of M*A*S*H, which Rindt had also loaned me. To this day, it's one of my favourite comedies.
Three years later, Rindt and I were both living in the suburbs of Cleveland. One of us had seen that The Exorcist was being re-released in theaters featuring about seven minutes of footage that had been deemed too scary to be released in 1973. We went to see it together and were both properly scared by it. This is one of those instances when seeing it in your living room is no comparison to seeing it in a theater. It shot to the top of my scariest movies list and has been there for 25 years now. I watched the film again when director William Friedkin passed away and was delighted to find my ticket stub from that night in the DVD case (just a little something I do).
"I've seen The Exorcist about 167 times, and it keeps getting funnier every single time I see it!"
--Michael Keaton as Beetlejuice, 1988
Since the end of the pandemic, we've been seeing people within the movie industry talking--even preaching--about how movies are so much better in theaters. Sure, streaming them at home is more convenient, but the experience is better. And I agree with them wholeheartedly. For as corny as Nicole Kidman's AMC ad may seem, and in spite of how much the whole thing was ridiculed, everything she says in that ad is spot on. I watch a lot of movies from the comfort of my living room, but when I see them in theaters (especially classics that I've seen multiple times), comedies are more over the top, action films are more intense, and horror films are scarier than they are at home.
Shortly after I moved to the South Bend/Mishawaka area, I was working in the now defunct music and video department of Barnes & Noble. While straightening the blu-ray section one day, I had discovered that some customer had just left a paperback copy of The Exorcist on the shelf rather than taking the effort to re-shelve it where they had originally found it. Normally (as you might have guessed), this annoys the hell out of me. But, given my history with the novel, I bought it rather than complain about less savory customer habits.
I read it the week I turned 39. As the son of a librarian, I decided to compare the two. I have to say it is one of the most faithful book-to-screen adaptations I've ever seen. I'm sure most of this can be attributed to William Peter Blatty who not only wrote the novel, but also the screenplay. (Although I've seen other films where the screenwriter adapted his or her own novel and completely changed everything--more on this in upcoming weeks) I will go as far as to say it is the scariest book I've ever read. And the character of Father Merrin is even more badass in the novel than he was in the movie.
Mom confessed to me that the book freaked her out so much she had never seen the movie. I felt she needed to, so I made her watch it a couple months before she died. I'm pretty sure the two events were not related...
So, in honour of Hallowe'en, the connection between literature and cinema, and my mother--one of the greatest small-town librarians of all time--this week I'm recommending 1973's The Exorcist.
Until next week, stay safe, be good to your neighbours, and please remember that if at first you don't succeed, then skydiving definitely isn't for you.
Yours in peace, love, and rock 'n' roll!
The Reverend Will the Thrill
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| Ticket stub from The Exorcist re-release, 2 October, 2000 |
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