The Exorcist Still has the Potential to Scare

The Exorcist is a phenomenal movie. Personally I believe it is one of the scariest films I have ever seen. Even though, the special effects are not as sophisticated as they get today, it still has the ability to scare. The whole plot of the movie is put together so well that the viewer at the beginning wonders how such a normal family can be a victim to a demon.

At the beginning of the movie we get introduced to the family that seems perfectly normal and happy, even though it’s not complete since the father of Regan is living somewhere else. Still, the little girl has a good connection with her mother and she seems joyful. The trouble and strange behavior starts when Regan finds the Ouija Board and begins playing with it. She shows her mother how it works and as she put her fingers on a pointer it slipped to the side as if someone pushed it. After that Regan starts acting strange. She has the occasional flashes of the devil like creature which is really creepy, and it scared the viewer because they are really unexpected.

Later on in the movie when the demon gets comfortable in Regan’s body, the movie became really scary. The special effects are not the best but the make up done on the actors is extremely well done. Green contacts and scratches all over the face as well as yellow teeth make the little girl look very evil. Another thing that works really well is the meanly voice and how she speaks make her even more devilish. The picture below is a great example of the look that is frightening.

Another scene that looks very bizarre is when the girl is getting an exorcism and she suddenly flips her eye and she begins to float and go up from the bed like she was able to fly. Her body was positioned like a cross which made an ironic connection since she was a demon and her body was floating like a cross which is a symbol of Christianity. This scene looked really realistic even though the computer generated animation was not as sophisticated as it is today.

However, there were some scenes that were not considered scary today. The scene where the mother walks into the room and Regan slaps her and than starts to move furniture and do all those unnatural things does not really work. Later she sits on the bed and her head turns all the way around which looks unrealistic and funny in some way.

Another thing that did not fit into the movie and did not make it scarier was the green vomit. It was unrealistic and more disgusting than frightening. Still, it did give the feel of how insulting the demon was, but the special effects today would do a better job with creating a vomit more realistic.

After all, The Exorcist did a good job with scaring people. The whole concept and plot of the movie seemed scarier then some special effects that were used. Still, the movie was done very well and it still has a potential to scare people even in today’s world where computer animation is astounding.