Exorcist vs Exorcist

If any of you had the unfortunate luck to see Renny Harlin's Exorcist: The Beginning last fall, you know it wasn't very good. This prequel to the original 1973 William Friedkin horror milestone The Exorcist fell short on many levels, becoming in the end just another bad, gory special effects horror film.

BUT, what you may not know is that in 2003, another director, Paul Schrader (writer of Taxi Driver and director of Blue Collar) was assigned the task of making a prequel to the Exorcist. He did, and upon completion, the studio execs hated it. Enough so that they claimed it was not even marketable as a horror film. So the entire 99% completed film was canned, along with Schrader and all the cast except for Stellan Skarsgård.

After the complete lack of successs of Exorcist: The Beginning, Paul Schrader's version, Dominion: A Prequel to the Exorcist, began being screened in a limited number of theaters. Far superior to Harlin's film, Dominion takes a stance of less gore and more psychology and history, particularly on Father Merrin. The two stories are quite similar, dealing with Merrin's loss of faith during his early priesthood in Holland during the Nazi occupation. He is forced to pick 10 parishiners to be executed by the Nazi's, This leaves Merrin broken, and he takes a leave of the Church and goes to Africa for an archaeological dig. There he discovers a 5th century Christian church buried beneath the sands, seemingly on purpose. As the dig uncovers more and more of the church, evil seems to be washing throught the valley. The only hope in all the evil is a young native boy, Cheche, born with a disfigured arm and recovering from a badly broken leg. He heals at amazing speeds, while the British army and the native tribe prepare to clash outside. As the evil builds, it is obvious that some Evil is affecting them all, and it is linked to the church.

With some minor CG effects and some forgivably cheesy scenes, Schrader's brooding Prequel is the antithesis of the over-the-top original, and an altogether better film than the previous prequel. Though not perfect, I would definately suggest checking these two films out for yourself and making your own decision.

Also, check out my review of A History Of Violence now on DVD over at Left Of Center on PodCasterNews.com.

And look forward to a bunch of reviews in the comming weeks as I attend the 30th Cleveland International Film Festival.