The Exorcist: Believer (2023), Dir David Gordon Green, Universal Pictures. 2**: Matthew Alicoon.

The Exorcist: Believer (2023), Dir David Gordon Green, Universal Pictures.

2**: Matthew Alicoon.

Running Time: 111 Minutes

The Exorcist: Believer follows two young girls who disappear into the woods and three days later they return but both show signs of demonic possession, leading to Victor Fleming (Leslie Odom. JR) to turn to Chris MacNeil (Ellen Burstyn) who has had a first-hand experience of possession through her daughter.

The film starts out rather jarringly with a brilliantly hectic and lively start to the film which shows significant signs of promise. However, after the opening the film cascades into a downward spiral of what can be described as pure and downright nonsense, that not only makes The Exorcist: Believer insignificant but does leave the question what on earth were the filmmakers trying to achieve?

The film succumbs to major shortcomings that are worth discussing. Throughout the narrative, there is a consistent need for characters to explain events at an explicitly thorough extent, therefore the mystery is never fully realised, as the exposition dumping throughout took away any form of obscurity and suspension. The dialogue feels staged and the reactions to events seem quite blurred and problematical, therefore never being able to suspend disbelief because the scenarios feel staggeringly played and not dramatically absorbing. The line deliveries genuinely feel all over the place.

The characters feel unbelievably one dimensional and thinly drawn out, as after the opening sequence they hardly ever reverse back into what could have been an influential play of trauma. The lead of Victor Fleming just needed more richness to his character. Ann Dowd gets minimum to play with. The most bothering character writing is the two young girls Angela and Katherine, as while the horror strikes them there is a huge amount of simplicity with the characters. By the time the final exorcism sequence comes around, you will likely have already checked out.

The audacity to shoehorn Ellen Burstyn in the way they did is preposterous and just absurdity at the peak of the power in the film. Bringing someone back for nostalgia vs bringing someone back for narrative purposes are two completely different things and this film decides for nostalgia. However, genuinely taking Ellen Burstyn out would have made no difference to the story yet they could not have used The Exorcist name otherwise, as the actual story has very little to do with the original Exorcist going back to how inconsequential the film is.

Perhaps The Exorcist Believer’s biggest sin is that it is not scary enough in the slightest. There are glimmers of what fascinating sequences could have been, as for example one of the daughters walks into a church with quite the entrance but nothing is ever exceeded. The horror is at a simplistic base, leading to predictability because the film lacks any dramatic beating punches whatsoever. Events always feel like a set up rather than natural horror.

It leaves you going out on a bitter note wanting the franchise to never come back. Whilst the new incarnations of Halloween were divisive, they were 3 distinctively different chapters in the saga where hopefully David Gordon Green decides to completely recast and tell a hopefully unique fresh story in the upcoming Exorcist films. It is a controversial take, but the direction of Halloween Ends focused on demonstrating how evil can transpire throughout a town and that gave the movie its own personality. Unfortunately, The Exorcist: Believer is quite boringly plodding and never amounts to anything satisfying.

Let us see if David Gordon Green can get back on track with The Exorcist: Deceiver in 2025.