Day 20 - The Last Exorcism (2010)

So yeah . . . Wow! That is not what I expected. I went into to this thinking it was going to be something like a found footage version of The Exorcism of Emily Rose. It isn't. In case you haven't noticed I have a bit of penchant for found footage films if they're done correctly. On that note, here is a fairly comprehensive list of the rules found footage films should follow. I can't say I agree 100% with these rules, or maybe they just need to be defined a bit better, but for the most part they work. The Last Exorcism seems to abide nicely by these rules.

The Last Exorcism is a documentary in the making about an evangelical preacher, at odds with his faith, who has agreed to let a film crew document his final exorcism. The joke is, Reverend Cotton Marcus doesn't even believe in exorcisms, not in the sense that the church does. He doesn't even believe in demons. But when he answers a call for help in a small, backwoods Louisiana town circumstances begin to get out of hand. Something is going on in the Sweetzer household that Rev. Marcus can't logically explain.

The only thing that I could find to say about The Last Exorcism is that it isn't really scary. It's certainly eerie and creepy but not scary. But in short, I'm in love with this movie. A friend that I watched it with thought it was a bit slow and boring, but then he doesn't like movies that don't have excessive gore and lots of nudity, so his opinion doesn't count. This is something that should be taken into account before seeing this movie though; this is not one of those movies that will have you cringing at gore or jumping out of your seat. Also, there isn't anything extremely original about TLE, yet it's done such a way to still make it fun. There's also a nice twist ending that uplifts this movie in my eyes. I would highly recommend The Last Exorcism.

For Day 21 I'll be reviewing Stake Land (2010).