The Last Exorcism
One of the most satisfying chillers in recent years, it combines humour and horror as successfully as Wes Craven's original Scream.
Producer Eli Roth and German director Daniel Stamm have taken a genre that has had many unsuccessful attempts at impressing horror fans and turned out an ingenious mockumentary.
Patrick Fabian is a force of nature as Reverend Cotton Marcus, oozing the sort of charisma that is dangerous in the wrong hands. Born into a family of evangelical ministers, he took the profession at a young age, after showing prodigious talent at showmanship. He's being filmed by documentary maker Iris (Iris Bahr), and it's through her cameraman's viewfinder we see the entire film.
Cotton's opening admission that all the exorcisms he performs are fake leads to some uproariously funny moments. Fabian's devilish glee as he owns up to the smoke and mirrors and manipulation sets up The Last Exorcism, as he invites the film crew to follow one last job. Cotton is by no means an unsympathetic trickster - he's giving people what they want while trying to support a family that has expensive medical needs - and it's his worry about an "exorcism school" potentially leading to deaths that spurs on his confession.
He fatefully chooses the Sweetzer family for his last exorcism, and his trip to their remote Louisiana farm is filled with brilliant asides from the bible-bashing locals, with Iris and Cotton (and the viewer) barely containing their mirth. The team find father Louis (Louis Herthum) and older son Caleb (a scene-stealing Caleb Landry Jones), who are desperately worried about 16-year-old Nell (Ashley Bell), a naive home-schooled young girl they suspect of slaughtering the livestock in the night. After Cotton performs his "exorcism" (hilariously intercut with his preparation from the car boot), they leave the family in supposed peace.
That's when the shit hits the fan, for Cotton is to be confronted with a situation that tests his actually genuine faith. Bell's perfectly-controlled performance as the possessed girl leaves you guessing, as Cotton and Iris debate Nell's condition and try and piece the clues together. Stamm and Roth don't go down The Exorcist route with their story, keeping all of Nell's physical manifestations within the realms of belief. More a psychological thriller than supernatural horror, it doesn't make it any less terrifying, with some genuine shocks and good old-fashioned scares - gorehounds may be left wanting, but I'm happy to see a film that doesn't rely on blood and guts for a change. The balance of power in the house is used to threatening effect, and the unravelling of Cotton's confidence is fascinating.
One of the most satisfying chillers in recent years, it combines humour and horror as successfully as Wes Craven's original Scream, using the influence of The Blair Witch Project for its involving photography. US audiences have bitched themselves silly about the ending, but it felt perfect to me - prophetic, chaotic, abrupt, and open to interpretation. But then, I am a Lost fan...
Subscribe to the SG News Feed
