Review of The Exorcist III (1990) by Brian C — 21 Oct 2007

First off, what you have to know about this film is it wasn't meant to be called Exorcist 3, the film was heavily tampered with by the producers to make it more like The Exorcist (or rather, more like their idea of what the first film was about).

Like The Ninth Configuration it was meant to be a separate film with links to the first one.

That said it still has Blatty's sense of humour and some truly creepy moments and one scene which will scare the previous night's dinner right out of your body.

All this without much in the way of gore and a lot to say about the nature of evil.

Try to get hold of the original book Legion (which should have been the title of this film) and the original shooting script.

Hopefully one day the original cut of this film will turn up.

As it is, this film is a desecrated little masterpiece of the understated.

The acting is superb.

Forget the awful prequels and the terrible first sequel.

After the original, this is the only one that matters.