The Exorcism - Slay This Movie

When I went see this, it was after an 8-day work week. There were only night showings 7 or 10. I went to the 7 in our theater's smaller room. Only four aisles, but the big comfy chairs. There was a family to my right and a small group to my left. Why is this important? One was snickering half the movie and the other was chatting throughout.

Meaning? The experience wasn't as strong as it should or could have been. I was a little tired so all these affected how I saw and enjoyed the movie. That being said...

This movie was awful. I would have rathered be watching a sequel to The Pope's Exorcist. It would star the same person and had been slightly better...maybe.

In this one, Russel Crowe is an actor fresh out of rehab and taking care of his daughter who just got suspended from school for throwing paint on her principal's car. She had her reasons and while I don't condone, I approve. Her mom died and with a fairly absentee father, she holds a lot of anger and resentment towards him.

As he's getting used to being a father again, he's auditioning for a new movie about a priest who performs an exorcism. As many of these styles of movie set is cursed.

This is where the problems begin. Situations like this aren't unheard of in Hollywood. Strange things happened during the filming of both The Exorcist and Poltergiest 1-3.

This movie had a severe lack of show and tell. The build up to what was happening and the possession was so slow paced. I was dozing off it was so slow and when I did close my eyes for a moment, that's when they decided to show something. The few jump scares were the cheap ones that I hate - all quiet then suddenly they up the music 10x with a startle. That is not scary. It doesn't frighten you, it startles you. There's a difference.

It was just a bland horror movie. Few scares. The climax was the only half decent part of the movie. You were wondering what was going to happen, but not enough to really care. Then when it did end, it just ended.

If I could fix the movie, I'd definitely have more build up to the possession. More things going wrong on set. Clocking in at about 90 minutes, it probably should have been longer. But at the same time, it felt long with what they had.

The cast was decent. While I liked the daughter well enough, there wasn't much past moody teen. Crowe as the actor and dad was just bland. When he was possessed there was a little something there, but not enough to make you fear for his soul. Adam Goldberg as the director was good. He comes across as a major jerk, but mostly cause he's trying to get his actor to give his best work, diving into the psyche of the actor so he can give the performance he needs.

Overall, I will not be going out of my way to watch this again. If you're curious, wait until it's streaming and even then, I wouldn't rush. Even if you love horror, this won't be something I'd be in a hurry to watch.

I was just hoping for more.

1/5