The Exorcism (MA15+. 95 minutes)
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3 stars
A boozy, washed-up former superstar is given a leading role in an Exorcist-like horror film in this snake-that-eats-its-own-tail of a horror film.
While Canberra eagerly awaits the arrival of Lindy Lee's Ouroboros in the grounds of the National Gallery of Australia, this heavily meta American horror film is the closest thing we can experience until the giant metal sculpture of the circular tail-swallowing creature arrives.
Crowe plays an actor cast in a film about demonic possession who gets possessed, demonically, and if that's not Ouroborosian enough for you, the actual film's director, Joshua John Miller, is the son of the late Jason Miller, the actor who played Father Damian Karras in the original 1973 The Exorcist.
![Russell Crowe in The Exorcism. Picture supplied Russell Crowe in The Exorcism. Picture supplied](/images/transform/v1/crop/frm/MxhEgQKUJhZgHxwVaKiqcq/89a59f1f-f80d-4f45-ab64-5316c3f818c9.jpg/r0_0_2362_1333_w1200_h678_fmax.jpg)
The younger Miller wrote the screenplay with his partner MA Fortin, and Crowe's role very obviously echoes the Father Damian role.
Anthony Miller (Crowe) is lucky to receive a call inviting him to take over the leading role in a horror movie after an actor dies.
The job might just keep him away from the bottle, and it will keep him close to his daughter Lee (Ryan Simpkins) who has just been expelled from school and for whom he lands a production assistant job.
Lee starts a little on-set fling with the film's female lead Monica (Marcenae Lynette), performer of the possessed-girl role that Anthony's Catholic priest character is called in to save.
But the production's on-set religious adviser, Father Conor (David Hyde Pierce), warns that there is something truly sacrilegious happening on the set and that the demon Moloch is after Anthony's soul.
The film's director (Adam Goldberg) is unhappy with Anthony's performance but the actor is struggling, definitely with his sobriety, but eventually with some frightening and other-worldly presence inside himself.
This is a terrific concept and it must have been equal parts cathartic and messed-up for Miller to exorcise his own set of family demons on this production. Probably the more interesting of these to unpack is just how vile a piece of human crap Goldberg's character is - the stories of the way The Exorcist's director William Friedkin treated his performers wouldn't stand up to today's social-media shaming or film set health and safety regulations. The film's set-within-a-set of the film-within-a-film is a fascinating bit of work, a four-storey house with one side open for filming, and with a "cold room" so the characters can film while their breath turns eerily to ice.
I really enjoyed Crowe in this, getting the chance to ham it up.
The movie was meaty fun, with demonic possession contact lenses and bodies contorted beyond belief. It has quite the stellar cast, including Sam Worthington as one of the film's priest co-stars.
There are a few plot holes that had me wondering if demons also possessed the editing room, or perhaps the production budget. But the film is darkly shot and intentionally grainy, so perhaps I just missed where those holes were patched up in all the gloom.
At my screening, a large group of teenagers had bought tickets and were having a wonderful time occasionally getting up and sneaking behind their friends to give them additional fourth-dimension experience with a loud "Boo!"