Two films that explore faith as well as representations of good and evil that endure through generations — it's The Exorcist vs Enchanted.
Read The Episode
Every episode of Tasteless, I take a critically acclaimed film and compare it to one that shares the same themes but didn't get the attention it deserves — and explain why that second movie is my pick. This week: two films that explore faith as well as the ultimate representations of good and evil. It's The Exorcist versus Enchanted.
The Exorcist
When a mysterious entity possesses a young girl, her mother seeks the help of two Catholic priests to save her life.
This movie came out in 1973 and has an 83% on Rotten Tomatoes. It won the Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay for William Peter Blatty, who adapted the film from his own novel, and it also won for Best Sound. It was nominated for another eight Oscars — Best Picture, Best Lead Actress for Ellen Burstyn, Best Supporting Actor for Jason Miller, Best Supporting Actress for Linda Blair, Best Director for William Friedkin, Best Cinematography, Best Art Direction, Best Film Editing. That's crazy for a horror movie. A genre often maligned for supposed cheap scares and tricks — it's hard to get a horror movie the recognition it deserves.
The Exorcist was a success. It's famous for the reactions it elicited in audiences — people keeling over, passing out, barfing. Very upsetting. I'm glad I didn't see this in theaters in 1973. I knew the basics of this film, but I recently watched it for the first time. The sense of foreboding woven throughout is impressive.
It starts in this desert. This old guy, Max von Sydow — he's Father Merrin, a priest at an archaeological dig who finds a weird little statue of a demon. Maybe don't pick up dusty artifacts. We learned this in The Mummy. Don't pick stuff up out of the sand. Anything that's in the sand, it wants to be there. But then this guy is almost trampled by horses. He's just walking around looking dazed and scared. I felt like the desert was too hot for this old man. Clearly something bad is happening.
Then we meet Ellen Burstyn. Her character Chris McNeil is an actress, but we only see her being an actress for about four minutes at a fake protest scene. Is Ellen Burstyn ever not stressful? Are there movies where she just has a nice time? I haven't seen them. Poor Ellen Burstyn. Her kids are Jared Leto in Requiem for a Dream and the damn devil in this movie. And then Pieces of a Woman seems like a real bummer. And in SVU, she's Elliot Stabler's mom and bipolar and refuses to get help. Ellen Burstyn never gets to just chill.
In one scene, the lights flicker off and Ellen is just darting her eyes back and forth. Really good moment. She portrays this trembling inner fear so well she makes the viewer feel nervous, even though she has the same haircut as Danny in The Shining. Very upsetting.
Of course, this film's exorcism is centered on Ellen Burstyn's daughter Reagan, played by Linda Blair. Linda was in this great weird 80s horror movie called Hell Night. She also played an obnoxious reporter, uncredited, in Scream. I love when someone leans into their career. Linda raises money for the Linda Blair WorldHeart Foundation, an animal welfare organization, by selling autograph prints and memorabilia. She has used this thing she's so known for, for good, and I love that.
The role obviously skyrocketed her to fame. And it's upsetting how much was stacked against her. According to the Exorcist Wiki, the agency representing Linda Blair recommended 30 other clients for the part but not Linda, and Linda's mother brought her in herself. Then, due to death threats from religious zealots who believed the film glorified Satan, Warner Brothers had to hire bodyguards to protect her for six months after the film's release. People are insane.
Linda Blair received a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination. But William Friedkin really pushed that she was the only person who portrayed this role because he wanted realism. But Mercedes McCambridge provided the voice of the demon. When she wasn't credited, it caused controversy. They couldn't take back the nomination when that was found out, but it really killed her chances of winning.
Mercedes insisted on swallowing raw eggs and chain smoking to alter her vocalizations. She had problems with alcohol in the past and wanted to drink whiskey to mess up her voice and create the crazed state of mind. At William Friedkin's direction, McCambridge was also bound to a chair with pieces of a torn sheet at her neck, arms, wrists, legs, and feet to get a more realistic sound of the demon struggling against its restraints. Then Mercedes had to sue Warner Brothers for credit as the voice of the demon.
Basically, Linda Blair is this kid. The production of the movie has nothing to do with her. And the director is like, yeah, she did it. And she's just like, yeah, I did it. And then people are like, how dare you take credit? It just sucks.
She's possessed by a demon that claims to be the devil. The bed is shaking, she's screaming. At first I'm thinking, okay, get off the bed. But then I realized that when an earthquake happens, I just stay on the bed and assume I'm dying. I can't really judge.
Her mom takes her to doctors, to multiple doctors for different tests. One test is just blood shooting out of a throat hole. Very normal test. One of the first ones they do. They put a hole in your throat, have some blood shoot out, and go, okay, blood's coming out, that's good. Apparently it was a relatively accurate version of this test and William Friedkin claims students have used it to study the procedure, but it is a shocking scene.
Burstyn's like, okay, I guess we get a priest because I don't know what to do. The doctors are like, there's some alien intelligence, a spirit if you will. These scientists are ridiculous. Reagan is straight up purple and green and talking in this demon voice and scientists are like, uh, maybe something's weird with her brain? I don't know.
So Ellen Burstyn gets Father Karras, played by Jason Miller — a priest who has been doubting his own faith and whose mother is having a hard time and ultimately dies. He's kind of like, I don't know that exorcism is what we should be doing. And the scene where Reagan projectile vomits at Father Karras only required one take — the vomit was intended to hit Jason Miller in the chest, but the plastic tubing misfired, hitting him in the face. His reaction of shock and disgust is genuine, and he admitted he was very angered by this mistake. If a demon threw up on me, I would not be able to continue my life. It would be done.
Then we get back to Father Merrin from the beginning, Max von Sydow. He's called in because Karras is like, all right, maybe we do an exorcism. And the higher-ups are like, okay, we've got to get the big guns. This guy, Father Merrin, he'd done one before and almost died. Let's get him. And it's so sad because he's out in the woods hanging out and some other priest comes up and gives him this paper, which clearly says, hey, you've got to come do an exorcism. And he just looks at it and it's like: God, fine. I guess I'll go die doing another exorcism.
My final review: this movie has too many fluids coming out of too many holes. But it's definitely worth a watch.
Enchanted
A young maiden in a land called Andalasia, who is prepared to be wed, is sent away to New York City by an evil Queen, where she falls in love with a lawyer.
This movie came out in 2007, has a 93% on Rotten Tomatoes. Enchanted was nominated for three Oscars — three Best Song Oscars. They had a 60% chance of winning with "Happy Working Song," "So Close," and "That's How You Know." Lost to "Falling Slowly" from Once. Honestly, very unacceptable.
This movie is a mix of animation and live action. We start with the animation — animated Amy Adams running into animated James Marsden. They're both singing. They decide to get married the next day, but then she's sent by a witch, Susan Sarandon, to a place where there are no happily ever afters — aka modern-day New York. Amy is of course confused by this loud, bright new world. She lands in Times Square in her giant wedding dress. The imagery, the cinematography in this movie is so striking.
Amy Adams is incredible. To pull off this level of cartoonish bigness and not be annoying — she's so naive, so earnest. Yet I have no cynicism towards her. I'm rooting for her from moment one.
Let's talk Amy Adams roles for a second. Arrival should have gotten her an Oscar. At least a nomination. She has six Oscar nominations. Junebug was her first, one of her earlier roles. Doubt was her next — her and Philip Seymour Hoffman and Meryl Streep dealing with scandal in a church setting. The Fighter she was so good in. The Master she was so good in. American Hustle, Vice.
Other movies she should have been nominated for: this one — Enchanted. Big Eyes. Trouble with the Curve. The movie Her. The Muppets. Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day. Sunshine Cleaning. Her episodes of The Office, her episode of Charmed, her episode of Buffy. Talladega Nights. Cruel Intentions 2. All of her scenes in Psycho Beach Party. Drop Dead Gorgeous. All things she should have been nominated for Oscars for. Am I just screaming her IMDB? Yes, I am. Amy Adams should have 200 Oscars.
Everything she does, she is a joy to watch. She's such a talented — workhorse feels like an offensive word, but whatever she is in, she is making it better. She was working for ages before hitting it big. She put just as much heart and humor and reality into the small roles as the big ones. I mean, Talladega Nights — she's the mousy assistant that winds up with Will Ferrell at the end. It's so good. She can do so broad, so specific. She gets dark humor. She gets drama. She can make you cry. And not only can she portray any role, she can sing like an angel.
"Happy Working Song." Brilliant. The pigeons and rats and roaches come and help her clean up because basically it's the classic Disney song — she calls all the forest creatures to come help her clean. But the forest creatures of New York are pigeons and rats and roaches and they help her clean and it's amazing.
When she steps out of the shower and the birds put the towel around her body, her wide-eyed grin — it could easily be insipid, but it's not. It's utterly charming. She makes a dress out of curtains. She nails every single layer of comedy and rings every funny moment out of a scene in a way that doesn't chew the scenery and that only enhances the work of her co-stars.
When Amy Adams lands in modern-day New York, she tries to find her way home and climbs up onto a billboard that looks like an enchanted castle. There, Patrick Dempsey and his young daughter find her and try to help. Patrick Dempsey is the stereotypical love interest grump. I hate fun. I have floppy hair but a rigid personality. He is perfect for this because Amy's head-in-the-clouds nature needs a little grounding to get used to New York. Who better than a single dad who helps couples get divorced and doesn't really live life for himself?
Although he does become the true villain of the movie when they're walking through the park and she's eating something — like a donut or a cinnamon bun — and she's like, this is so yummy, nibbling. And he goes, you all done? and takes it from her hand and throws it out. She wasn't done, there was still some left, Patrick Dempsey.
When they're walking in the park, we hear another of the Oscar-nominated songs, "That's How You Know." This is another fun movie moment where you're sucked in, everybody's singing and dancing. Patrick gets the classical musical moment of being like, wait, how does everyone know this song but me? I know I'm banging on him, but if I was with someone and they started singing in the park, I would be distraught. I'd be like, why do you all know this song? Why are you doing this to me?
Amy, with Patrick Dempsey, explores nuance — different emotions other than just excitement, happiness, true love. She gets to feel anger for the first time. That feeling disconnects her from her prince, James Marsden. James doesn't feel anger — he feels just dopey happiness at all times. When he and Amy are reunited, they don't click in the same way. James Marsden — perfect for this role. Handsome prince. Not fair that he can also sing. He comes to rescue her. He really does want what's best for her, but he doesn't grow or change. And she does.
She's obviously starting to fall for Patrick Dempsey. He has a girlfriend: Idina Menzel. Now, the one knock against this movie — it is a full Disney musical with Idina Menzel and Idina does not sing a note. Absolutely insane. Why? Why would you put her there and not let her sing?
Susan Sarandon comes to town — she's the witch, James Marsden's stepmother. She comes to get Amy Adams to eat a poison apple. She rises up in Times Square in a plume of green smoke from a sewer. She's so evil in the most cartoonish, amazing way. She sneaks Amy an apple. And that's another cinematography moment — Amy is looking at the apple and her face is reflected in it. She takes a bite. And of course she dies, or passes out and will die if she doesn't get revived by midnight.
James Marsden is like, I need to kiss her. True love's kiss. He kisses her. Nothing. And then he's like, hold on, Patrick Dempsey, you should kiss her. You're probably her true love. Patrick Dempsey is like, I'm kind of dating Idina Menzel. And Idina Menzel is like, just go ahead, Patrick. Just kiss her. Because even she is like, obviously you should be with Amy Adams. What a secure, wonderful woman.
Then we get the great moment of Amy saving Patrick from the evil dragon. Giselle — that's Amy's name in the movie — is like, is this a habit of yours, falling off of stuff? And Patrick says, only when you're around to catch me. I love that they turned it on its head.
Then James Marsden and Idina Menzel hop into a storm drain. I would hop into a storm drain with either of them to go live in the fairy tale land and have their own wedding. And the movie ends with a shoeless family dance, which I love just as much as I loved it in Matilda.
I haven't even talked about Nathaniel. Nathaniel is great — the henchman, played by Timothy Spall, who's a perfect henchman. IMDB's bio for him is: short, roly-poly, pudding-faced Timothy Leonard Spall was an award-winning classical character actor. Short, roly-poly, pudding-faced Timothy. That is so rude.
Shared Themes
Good versus evil is a big, broad concept — one that's at the core of most movies, of most stories. A good guy and a bad guy. The Exorcist and Enchanted are two representations rooted in a certain way of thinking: The Exorcist in religion and Enchanted in fairy tale and the world of Disney. These films tap into the types of stories we are told that are meant to shape how we perceive the world — whether that's religious lessons and doctrine or fairy tales with morals at the end. They're stories that endure in our lives across generations.
The Exorcist taps into our fears about the devil, demonic possession, an entity that is stopped only by holy water and the utterances of a priest. A pure evil, one that overtakes a child for no other reason than it can. Reagan has done nothing to deserve what happens to her. She hasn't brought it upon herself in any way. And that's an important part of the story — that she's an innocent and yet this is able to happen. The only people who can fix it, or attempt to, are those closest to God. The priests who speak from the Bible and fight off what has taken root in poor Reagan.
Ellen Burstyn is upset to find a crucifix in Reagan's room at one point, not wanting to admit that it may save her daughter — that something repelled by the presence of a crucifix could be inhabiting her child's body. People watching the film passed out, walked out, because of how intense the imagery was. Yeah, some of that was all the bodily fluids, but some of that was also tapping into this dark, primal fear we have within us.
What allows people to turn to religion in times of need is also what can be the downfall. We look back on exorcisms in olden times as barbaric and inhuman, but if we were unsure of how else to help someone we loved, I think many of us would at least give it a shot. In our bones and the stories passed down to us, we've been told that true evil can be fought by those who have been deemed worthy, blessed with the title of Father.
In modern times, religion is still a piece of who people are, still taught and learned and expressed. But we now also have the cult of media. The images we're presented every day in the art we consume, the stories we read, the bedtime stories our parents told us. Less often about demons and more often about princesses and princes, dragons and castles. These stories shape our morals and our expectations just as much as religion has. It's just a more in-touch, modern way of getting those lessons across.
Enchanted has its happy endings and its fun tropes, but it can be watched as a deconstruction of the Disney-fied idea of happily ever after that we've been fed by the media for decades.
These more modern depictions of good and evil show beautiful princesses who fall for a man who will take care of them. The princess marries him, lives as this bride. Evil are the older women jealous of the heroine's good looks, her youth. The messaging that lies under every rom-com, it's in Disney, it's in the muted fairy tales adapted from the more violent Grimm's stories — that a woman's value is in getting the attention of a man and supporting him, while a man must be the ultimate protector.
In Enchanted we explore these tropes, these extremes. We see Amy and James meet and decide to get married the next day. Then Amy meets Patrick Dempsey and realizes she has choices. But we see how she must fight that initial urge to do as she's told, do what she thinks she's been taught to do. Yeah, at the end of the day, the Evil Queen is evil. She poisons Amy. She's very rude to her little henchman guy. Susan Sarandon is awful to Nathaniel. There is still that black and white of evil and good. But in Enchanted's even more modern version of morality tales, we get to see choice — the henchman doing what is right, Amy exploring her own path, making choices for herself.
The Exorcist and Enchanted raise questions of faith — faith our characters must have in themselves and in their actions to defeat their foes.
In The Exorcist, faith is the central focus and exploration. Father Karras is a religious man but aligns much more with the scientists who repeatedly check Reagan for brain lesions, seizures, psychiatric problems. He questions his faith as he watches his mother suffer. He runs scientific tests on Reagan — flicking her with what he claims is holy water that she reacts to by screaming, and he later says it was only tap water. He also thinks to be possessed you need to speak in another language, and maybe she is, but then he finds out she's just speaking backwards and is like, she's a faker.
Father Karras's speaking backwards is kind of impressive and very scary, especially because she says the name of Merrin backwards — and it's like, how did she know he was coming? But Karras embraces what must be done with Father Merrin, and he completes the ultimate leap of faith when he demands the demon take his body instead of Reagan and then throws himself to his death.
There's something interesting to what bearing faith has on the physical. The psychiatrists Ellen Burstyn visits prior to linking up with Father Karras tell her to look into exorcism. Ellen says, you're telling me that I should take my daughter to a witch doctor? They don't think it's a demon, but they think Reagan believes that. So perhaps going through the ceremony will work through whatever inner turmoil is causing her to lash out. Basically the placebo effect.
This movie is scary if you believe in the possibility of demon possession, of exorcism. And it's scary if you don't — because someone does. On the mostly harmless side, you see people who believe in the Holy Ghost passing through them, flinging themselves around on the ground. On the scarier side, you see people who do awful things because they think some other entity is controlling them. Whether they claim a demon or Grand Theft Auto, they're ascribing their actions to something else. Their faith in that thing controlling them is what determines the outcome.
It comes down to what you believe. If you are not Catholic, you are less likely to believe you need an exorcism. People thinking they are possessed are most often Catholic or raised Catholic or associated with that faith more so than any other. There is something spiritual about this film, something that makes you question your own belief.
The film's production suffered its own events some call cursed. The set caught on fire. Ellen Burstyn had her spine injured being ripped on a wire — she said about William Friedkin that he's so dedicated to getting the shot right that some other considerations fall by the wayside. She was ripped back, landed on her coccyx, has a permanent injury. Actors Jack MacGowran and Vasiliki Maliaros both died while the film was in post-production — they also played characters that died in the film. Televangelist Billy Graham stated there is a power of evil in the film, in the fabric of the film itself.
At one show, a woman was so frightened she passed out and broke her jaw. She later sued, suggesting subliminal messages caused the accident. Warner Brothers settled. One subliminal message scholar believed such imagery to be authentic and not created by the filmmakers — therefore he deemed the film itself was possessed. But when he talked about it, the subliminal images he described were not actually in there. He imagined them. This movie sends people off the rails. It's what you are willing to let in. What you have faith in affects what's going to happen to you in a weird way.
In Enchanted, Patrick Dempsey keeps telling Amy she doesn't know what she's talking about. He tells his daughter that Amy is confused when she talks of this magical land of Andalasia. He thinks she's just a super weird non-fairy-tale human instead of a fairy tale woman plucked from her realm and unceremoniously dropped in Patrick's world.
But when Amy has been poisoned by the Evil Queen's apple, she only has until midnight to be revived. After James kisses her and nothing happens and the clock ticks forward, everyone turns to Patrick saying he can give true love's kiss and bring her back. He hesitates — no, no, I have a girlfriend. Even his girlfriend is like, just kiss her. And when he kisses her and she remains still for a moment, he is disappointed — because in that moment he believed it would work. He believed he would revive her. And then suddenly she is awake.
Whether the kiss was true love's kiss doesn't matter as much as having that faith. He needed to believe it was real because that's what gave him the magic to bring her back to life. He willed her back into existence with his love. He poured all of his love into her, hoping it would be enough.
He is so much happier when he lets these beliefs in. When Amy was just a crazy person, someone he wanted kept away from his daughter, someone who was a burden — he was like, this sucks, you're ruining my job. But when he believes she is who she says she is, it allows him to see the best parts of her. Her optimism and kindness are no longer naive but instead charming. It causes him to look at the world differently — approaching his job as a divorce lawyer not with cynicism but wanting what's best for the person in front of him.
Amy also puts her faith in true love — not in the way she thought. At first she's worried love has led her astray because when she's reunited with James Marsden, they're not having a good time. But she feels she owes him something because they're meant to be. She's bored of him, not challenged the way she is with Patrick. But she has faith things work out as they should. And when Patrick gives her true love's kiss and she reawakens, she's just as quick to put her faith in the love between herself and Patrick.
Although she's lived in a world where she's the damsel, she has faith she can protect this love. She rescues Patrick from the dragon and succeeds. She puts belief in herself as the hero in a way that changes who she is. And that's what makes her an incredible character and role model — this faith she has in herself and in the goodness of others to do the right thing.
What Enchanted Did Better
While The Exorcist played into the extremes of our beliefs, Enchanted purposefully brought its story into a world without magic to shatter those extremes, to ground them.
The Exorcist with its overabundance of fluids spraying around the screen, its subliminal imaging, its disgusting sexualized demon in the body of a young girl — it's all worst-case scenario, truly awful, meant to terrorize you. The demon takes on Father Karras's mother's voice to taunt him from beyond the grave. It flings people to their death. There's no subtlety and that's what's so frightening. The worst thing a mother could ever think of happening to her daughter is happening right in front of her. The movie's tension is ratcheted up and up and up. I understand why people keeled over — there's no respite, no time to take it in. You're hammered with aggressive imagery for over two hours.
It's effective. But I find it so intriguing on revisiting Enchanted that it takes these big ideas, these fairy tale characters, and mostly neuters them. The wisecracking chipmunk can only do little chipmunk peeps in the real world. Instead of gorgeous bluebirds, Amy is helped to clean by roaches and rats and pigeons — everyday animals. She fashions the apartment's curtains into a dress instead of wearing gorgeous fabrics made by a rabbit with some thread or whatever.
Enchanted evokes magic in the everyday, an intrigue in things closer to home. It takes the magical and makes it part of real life — instead of taking real life and making it extreme.
I think it's easier to evoke the emotion you want if you are just hammering the same note over and over, as The Exorcist does effectively. But I like the rises and falls of Enchanted.
The Exorcist leans into its stereotypes and religious mythos. Enchanted holds a mirror up to the romantic ideals, Disney-type stories that have been set forth in pop culture and turns them on their head. The Exorcist terrorizes viewers with its depiction of good and evil. It puts a real fear of God into people, fear of the devil. It came down on the side of the possession being real, giving the viewer every reason to believe Reagan's body had been taken over. The author took a real story about possession and adapted it.
Enchanted brings fairy tale archetypes we know to life, but then dismantles them, which is what makes the film so interesting. The Exorcist is about an exorcism — it's exactly what it says on the tin. Enchanted is about things not being enchanted at all, but how that's not what matters. It gives us a new lens through which we can view similar films, yet also captures the same joyful emotions that a more typical Disney film captures.
A kid can watch this movie and feel just as thrilled, have their imagination provoked in the same way as when they watch Cinderella or Sleeping Beauty. The fairy tale is the jumping-off point, but the movie fights against any expectations you set for it. It's what makes the film so charming and why it holds up now and will hold up in the future. It questions what we've been told by stories. The Exorcist enforces our deepest fears from stories. Both are valid approaches.
The Exorcist deserves a spot as one of the best all-time horror movies, as something that changed the landscape of horror. But Enchanted becomes something that can take on a life of its own across genres and can be taken at face value or looked at as something deeper. There are elements you see coming — you know she's going to end up with Patrick Dempsey. But that extra little twist of her saving him after he kisses her is what keeps me coming back.
I don't know that The Exorcist is something I need to revisit again. I think I got all I needed. So if you haven't seen either movie, I'd say watch them. Maybe don't watch them together like I did. Actually, you know what? Watch them together. Start with The Exorcist, then Enchanted, so you can go to bed less scared.
I'm going to go back to just repeatedly watching "Happy Working Song" on YouTube for the next 10 hours.
Hit me up at @tastelesspod. Tell me your favorite Amy Adams role. Or how we can get Ellen Burstyn on a nice vacation.