Review of The Last Exorcism (2010) by Sailoraide — 08 Jan 2011

The POV mock-documentary style horror has become something of a favorite of mine. I've never quite understood the denouncement of these films simply because they aren't real. Movies are about suspending reality and this style is no different. I remember watching The Blair Witch Project for the first time. I was absolutely convinced that it actually happened. That made the film 100x more enjoyable. While nowhere near as thrilling as Blair Witch or Paranormal Activity, The Last Exorcism is a worthy successor in the genre.

The movie follows Reverend Cotton Marcus, an admittedly fake exorcist and charismatic preacher, as he creates a documentary about his life. As part of the documentary, he selects one of the many requests for his services to be filmed in full. The Last Exorcism follows his efforts to fool a family who believes their little girl is possessed by a demon and eventually leads to a not-so exciting outcome.

As far as thrills go, there are enough to keep a viewer interested. However, I found myself slowly losing focus on the film as it went on. That is to say, it starts strong but finishes weak. In fact, the ending is so predictable and ultimately unsatisfying that my enjoyment of the first half of the movie almost felt wasted. This is really too bad because the film itself has an interesting subject and is really well-developed right up until the end. But as they say in sports, it's "what have you done for me lately," and the final few minutes of the film really ruined it for me.

Still worth watching, but do so with tempered expectations.