Mike Flanagan Directing The Exorcist 3 Sequel

My relationship to horror started like a lot of people’s because I was a ridiculously scared child. The thought of Freddy Krueger’s claws was enough to drive me to tears. Then I grew up and became obsessed with the genre and its controlled fears. I have a soft spot for exorcism storylines featuring the kind of horror that lingers and makes its way into your home. Blame it on my Catholic upbringing, but few things are more disturbing to me than watching Regan MacNeil, played by Linda Blair, spider walk down the stairs.

William Friedkin’s The Exorcist works because it is nasty yet disciplined. While there is projectile vomiting and all sorts of bodily fluids, at its core, Friedkin’s movie is a meditation on faith. The Exorcist III takes a similar approach, opting for restraint until it finally lets loose. Directed by William Peter Blatty, who wrote the original 1971 novel, it is a Frankenstein’s monster of a film stitched together under studio interference, featuring disjointed tones, recast parts, and an explosive ending that was a studio addition. It also features a frightening and undersung villain who makes Regan look like child’s play.

With Mike Flanagan’s upcoming franchise revival The Exorcist: Martyrs set to pair a serial killer case with demonic possession in a clear nod to Blatty’s film, Halloween is the perfect time to revisit a sequel that has earned cult status after years of being misunderstood.

A killer, back from the dead

The Exorcist III is based on Blatty’s 1983 novel, Legion, and is set 15 years after the MacNeil exorcism. Lieutenant Kinderman, played by George C. Scott, and Father Dyer, played by Ed Flanders, meet every year on the anniversary of the death of Father Karras, played by Jason Miller, who died at the end of the first film while saving MacNeil and completing her exorcism. As the two men catch up, Kinderman is more jaded than usual. He reveals that someone has been replicating the murders of the Gemini Killer, a man who was executed the same night that Karras died.

The killings get personal when Father Dyer is murdered while getting a checkup in a hospital. The prime suspect is a patient who has been confined to the psychiatric ward for 15 years and was catatonic until six months ago. When he awoke, he claimed to be the Gemini Killer.

The Gemini Killer

We eventually learn that the killer is actually the same demon who possessed and killed Karras. Seeking revenge, the demon placed the Gemini Killer’s soul in Karras’ dead body. The premise alone is mind-bending, but what is great about the film is how comfortable it is with doubts and questions. For most of the runtime, Blatty makes you wonder whether the possession is real or if it is all just mental illness.

In a choice forced on Blatty due to studio meddling, the Gemini Killer is played by both Brad Dourif, known as Grima in The Lord of the Rings and Chucky in Child’s Play, and Jason Miller, who returns to the franchise as Karras. The villain shifts faces depending on who he is speaking to. Kinderman sees his dead friend’s face, but when the killer speaks, we see Dourif. At times, Dourif delivers long, meandering monologues with tears streaming down his face, as if the body is rejecting the demon inside it.

While Regan was terrifying due to the sheer transgression of watching a young girl transform into a horrible demon, the Gemini Killer is not out to scandalize you. What is frightening is Dourif’s theatricality and the joy he projects when taunting Kinderman or clinically breaking down his killings beat by beat while bound in a straightjacket. The Exorcist III also brings back one of the original film’s best tricks: the demon’s morphing voice, which shifts from feminine to masculine and from old to young for an alien and monstrous effect.

It is a miracle that the Gemini Killer works at all. After Blatty finished shooting, the studio demanded a familiar face and an explosive exorcism finale, replacing Dourif with Miller. Miller’s health was declining, and he struggled to remember the long monologues, so the studio brought Dourif back. The role ended up as it appears in the final cut, split in two.

The original version was a hell of a lot purer and I liked it much more. As it stands now, it’s a mediocre film. There are parts that have no right to be there.

That quote comes from Brad Dourif speaking to Fangoria, as reported by Bloody Disgusting. While Dourif might not look back fondly on a film that cast him, cut him, and then cast him again, his work is a big reason why the film has been reappraised in recent years.

The blend of police procedural and demonic possession is what Mike Flanagan appears to be after with The Exorcist: Martyrs. The trailer teases a story that is clearly in conversation with The Exorcist III, featuring a homicide detective who catches a serial killer only for things to go wrong at his execution. Flanagan could do worse than having The Exorcist 3 as a blueprint, though his villain will have a lot to measure up to.

The Exorcist III is streaming on Prime Video.

Source: Polygon