Movie Review – Exorcist II: The Heretic

Exorcist II: The Heretic (1977)
Written by William Goodhart
Directed by John Boorman

Warner Brothers knew they wanted another Exorcist film after the success of the first picture. However, screenwriter William Peter Blatty and director William Friedkin had no desire to revisit this world. They told a complete story in the first picture, and the sequel would just be a silly idea. At first, the plan was to cut/paste the plot, but things quickly spiraled into unhinged territory when playwright William Goodhart was hired. He would retroactively add a backstory to Father Merrin from the first film by including the theories of a Jesuit priest who had some views about why demon possessions occurred and why some people seem to be targeted by them. Linda Blair would return as Reagan MacNeil, and even Max Von Sydow reluctantly returned to cameo as a younger Merrin. Kitty Wynn, as Sharon, the friend of the MacNeils, came back, but Ellen Burstyn flatly refused to come back as the girl’s mother. Not a great start.

With the first film’s two priests gone, we begin with a friend of Merrin’s, Father Lamont (Richard Burton) who witnesses his exorcism in Mexico go south as the victim burns herself to death. The Vatican assigns the troubled man Merrin’s death, wanting him to investigate the circumstances. Reagan is now a sixteen-year-old high school student living in New York City with Sharon (her mother is off working, is the excuse). She doesn’t seem to have any negative aftereffects and is under the treatment of Dr. Gene Tuskin (Louise Fletcher), who uses experimental hypnosis treatments. 

This treatment synchronizes the patient’s memories with the doctor to recreate them as if they are happening. It’s one of the many ludicrous plot devices in the film that completely disrespects the audience’s intelligence. Eventually, Father Lamont can see the memories of the demon who possessed Reagan, named Pazuzu, and knows that it has taken over the body of an African boy named Kokumo in the past. Lamont eventually realizes both Kokumo & Reagan possess powers of some kind and are really good people, which drew the demon there to corrupt them. The story takes an immaculate, clear-cut concept and overcomplicates it to complete absurdity.

One of the biggest problems with this story is that it brings back Reagan MacNeil under this weird assumption she was somehow the protagonist of The Exorcist. If you haven’t seen the film, you may think that because most of the classic footage that gets shown features her. The film’s protagonist is certainly not her, but that role can be argued to be shared by Father Karras or Chris MacNeil. Both of them experience complete arcs in the original movie, and the themes of that picture center on what they are experiencing. Yet Reagan is front and center here, featured in a manner that I found typical of the 1970s but nonetheless disturbing in how Hollywood chooses to photograph a minor.

Linda Blair is presented as a sex object in many scenes. Some of this is subtle (tight sweater tops), and others are more overt (wearing a sheer top during a sleepwalking scene, appearing as a demonic version of herself who attempts to seduce Father Lamont). Apparently, the writer & director wanted there to be even more sexually explicit content, but Blair & Burton both agreed that they were not comfortable with the film going in that direction. It was cut back but not entirely, resulting in a movie that made me feel bad for Blair, knowing how her Hollywood story went during this period and into the 1980s. Yet another child star is exploited by an uncaring system. 

This quickly gets lost because the film feels like an Italian B-movie knockoff of The Exorcist. Reagan doesn’t have much to her character and doesn’t go through any arc. Lamont does end up running off with her to “train her” after they go back to the house in Georgetown and battle the demon, which results in the place collapsing. That’s after Lamont travels to Africa, where he meets the adult Kokumo (James Earl Jones) and has a fever dream as a locust. It’s also clear that Sharon was acting as a stand-in for Ellen Burstyn because much of her dialogue regarding Reagan sounds like what a mother would say, not a family friend with temporary guardianship. If you’ve seen John Boorman’s other work, this sort of incoherent nonsense feels par for the course regarding some of his work. Previously, he’d made Deliverance and Point Blank, which are excellent. But he also directed Zardoz, which is batshit crazy, so…

The greatest crime this film commits is that it’s fucking boring. The first Exorcist film is a clever mix by Friedkin of grounded, near-documentary-like filmmaking with the existential themes brought to the table by Blatty. Father Karras’ crisis of faith is the engine that drives that story forward. His confrontation with the demon is the renewal of his faith and his own destruction. The irony is that to restore his faith, he must destroy himself. The film ends bittersweetly: the innocent child has been saved. Yet, the friends of Karras live in the wake of his sacrifice, unsure of how to move forward and now entering their own crises. 

In Exorcist II, we have experimental hypnosis, one of the most bizarrely designed children’s hospitals I’ve ever seen, Reagan doing a song & dance number for a school play, flashbacks to Africa, a secret cult with a temple on top of a perilous cliff, and other absolute bonkers crap. Where the first film plays things as an observer, letting this fantastic story feel realistic, the sequel goes off the rails from the start. Could this be a case of so bad it’s fun? Maybe, but so much of the film is dull, with nothing going on. Not a single idea is explored or developed meaningfully, and it just ends because all movies have to end at some point. 

This was Warner Bros.’s most significant day & date release to theaters at the time, and not surprisingly, it was a total flop. Apparently, opening night was met with bursts of laughter from the audience. There is no reason to watch this film if you are interested in the Exorcist franchise. As we’ll see in my following review, The Exorcist Part III makes an effort to correct course, which is a much better continuation of the story. Exorcist II: The Heretic will remain one of the all-time worst big-budget Hollywood films.