Fifty years after the original EoXORCIST, the franchise gets a reboot in this schlocky tale of two 12-year-old girls who come back possessed by demons after disappearing for three days. Exactly how and why this happens is never fully explained; the script is full of holes, one of several areas in which it falls short of the earlier version.
Linda Blair gets a credit and a brief reappearance as middle-aged Regan. Her elderly mother Chris MacNeil (Ellen Burstyn) has a key role: she is now an exorcist herself and together with dropout-nun Ann Dowd takes a lead role in de-possessing the girls; in this movie the priest gets to play third fiddle.
BELIEVER is a bit better (not much) than I've made it sound. The build-up is good, but the actual exorcism is inevitably a rehash and the CGI is less terrifying than the original's use of stunts and make-up. The acting teeters on the edge of parody. Ann Dowd, rigid as a drumskin and "fruity" as ever, is the best thing in it.
Linda Blair gets a credit and a brief reappearance as middle-aged Regan. Her elderly mother Chris MacNeil (Ellen Burstyn) has a key role: she is now an exorcist herself and together with dropout-nun Ann Dowd takes a lead role in de-possessing the girls; in this movie the priest gets to play third fiddle.
BELIEVER is a bit better (not much) than I've made it sound. The build-up is good, but the actual exorcism is inevitably a rehash and the CGI is less terrifying than the original's use of stunts and make-up. The acting teeters on the edge of parody. Ann Dowd, rigid as a drumskin and "fruity" as ever, is the best thing in it.