Unfortunately, I don’t have time to do one of my usual multi-article Halloween things this year, as I’m a tad busy editing two books. However, I did want to do something Halloween-themed. Seeing as there is a new Exorcist sequel out (I reviewed it here) and seeing as the original film is now 50 years old, I thought that I could take a brief look at the whole Exorcist film franchise and even explore the little-known Exorcist ‘sequel’ that seems to have been brushed under the carpet over the years.

When it was released 50 years ago and back in 1973, The Exorcist changed horror cinema forever. Pre-The Exorcist, horror films were seen as cheap nonsense. Post-The Exorcist and the horror genre began to change as studios thought of the genre as being worthy of putting more effort into it. The budgets began to increase and studios wanted to hire well-known actors to play roles. This was largely due to the fact that The Exorcist was nominated for ten, yes ten Oscars at the 1974 Academy Awards. Those nominations included: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actress, Best Cinematography and others.

Just as a quick aside, The Exorcist was the first horror film to be nominated for a Best Picture Oscar. Of the ten nominations, it went on to win two. One for Best Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium and one for Best Sound. The Exorcist may not have won any of the big Oscars, but the fact that it was nominated and that it did win two was one of the reasons it helped to change the horror genre.

For me, The Exorcist is still one of the finest horror films ever made. Even 50 years later, I think that it still has the power to shock and scare. Turn the lights off, watch on a big TV with a good sound system and The Exorcist is just as powerful now as it was five decades ago.

After the success of The Exorcist, Hollywood wanted more money and farted out Exorcist II: The Heretic in 1977. A film so bad that many a fan chooses to completely ignore it and it is often considered one of the worst sequels ever made. As truly terrible as this sequel is, it does feature some amazing music and cinematography though.

Apparently, at the film’s premiere in New York, people were laughing at how terrible Exorcist II: The Heretic was as they thought that it was meant to be a parody. Writer of the original novel and the screenplay of the first film, William Peter Blatty did say that he was the first to start laughing when he saw it in the cinema.

Then, the director of the first film (who had nothing to do with this sequel), William Friedkin was asked if he wanted to see the film ahead of its release:

“I tell you, I did see a great deal of Exorcist II, under the following circumstances. I was at the Technicolor lab, color timing something, and one of the timers said, ‘We just finished Exorcist II, would you like to have a look at it?’ And I don’t know why, but I went into the room and I sat through maybe 40 minutes of it. It’s the worst piece of shit I’ve ever seen. It’s a fucking disgrace.”

Yup, it’s pretty bad alright. Film critics and fans alike were not very kind to the film when it was released and nothing much has changed over the years either.

After that, the franchise was pretty much dead before it even had a chance to flourish. Then, The Exorcist III happened in 1990. Now, knowing how bad the first sequel was, I chose to avoid watching this one for many a year. What a mistake that was because The Exorcist III is pretty damn great. A tense film with some strong performances and one of the greatest jump scares in cinema history.

The thing about this sequel was that it was born from a 1983 novel (like the first film) called Legion and said novel was penned by (like the first film) William Peter Blatty. Originally, Blatty conceived the story to be a sequel to the first film that ignored Exorcist II: The Heretic. William Peter Blatty even approached the director of the original film, William Friedkin with the idea that the two would team back up and try to correct what went wrong with Exorcist II. The two then went to Warner Bros. with the idea and the studio loved it, as Blatty recalled:

“Everybody wanted Exorcist III… I hadn’t written the script, but I had the story in my head… and Billy [Friedkin] loved it.”

However, things did not work out as there were disagreements between William Peter Blatty and William Friedkin on the direction that the film should go in. And so, it wasn’t made. Still with the story in his head, Blatty turned it into a novel, Legion. The novel sold well and William Peter Blatty returned to his original idea of turning it into a screenplay and a film. Long story short, Blatty himself ended up directing the film and it is great.

Then, it went quiet for a while until we got not one, but two The Exorcist prequels. Okay, so technically, they are kind of the same film… but not. A brief recap for those not in the know. Exorcist: The Beginning was released in 2004. However, this film wasn’t the first attempt at making a prequel. It was ‘reworked’ from an earlier film called Dominion: Prequel to the Exorcist. That film was not very well received by the executives as it didn’t feature many scary scenes. So (very long story short) the director, Paul Schrader was fired and a new one, Renny Harlin was hired. The film was then re-written and shot as an all-new film, to then be released as Exorcist: The Beginning in 2004.

The film met with poor critical reception. This led to the studio deciding to release the original Dominion: Prequel to the Exorcist in 2005. While still not a great film, it is marginally better than Exorcist: The Beginning. So yeah, there are two prequels to The Exorcist, both kind of the same film, from two different directors after the studio were not happy with the first attempt. Which, when both were eventually released, the first film was slightly better than the second attempt after all. But both were still a huge waste of time and money.

Following the failure that was both prequels, the franchise was pretty much dead. Until The Exorcist, a direct TV show sequel to the original film, was made. It only ran for two seasons (2016-2017) because… it was pretty well-received. As it was well-received, it was cancelled because TV executives enjoy cancelling shows that people like. I’ve not yet seen the TV show but this is something that I aim to rectify when I have more time. It can’t be any worse than Exorcist II: The Heretic and the two prequels, can it?

Then we get into the more recent (and really bad) film from this year, The Exorcist: Believer, which is said to be the start of a new trilogy. So then, that’s all of The Exorcist sequels and prequels covered eh? Well, not quite as there was another ‘sequel’ that a lot of people are not aware of. For this, I need to do a hefty bit of explaining.

Author of the original The Exorcist book, William Peter Blatty penned a novel called Twinkle, Twinkle, “Killer” Kane!, which was published in 1966. Blatty had always thought of this novel as being a bit of a farcical comedy, but it also had elements of philosophy and theology. Thinking that it could make a good film, William Peter Blatty turned his novel into a screenplay with the intention of having it directed by William Friedkin. Blatty sent his screenplay to Friedkin who liked it, but couldn’t find a studio willing to make the film. Through that, William Peter Blatty and William Friedkin became friends and a few years later, they worked together on the film version of The Exorcist.

After finishing work on The Exorcist film, Blatty decided to re-write his Twinkle, Twinkle, “Killer” Kane! novel and it was published in 1978 with the new title of The Ninth Configuration. The following is taken from the introduction to the novel:

“When I was young and worked very hastily and from need, I wrote a novel called Twinkle, Twinkle, Killer Kane! Its basic concept was surely the best I have ever created, but what was published was surely no more than the notes for a novel – some sketches, unformed, unfinished, lacking even a plot. But the idea mattered to me, so once again I have written a novel based on it. This time I know it is the best that I can do.”

William Peter Blatty then thought it would be a good idea to turn his newly re-written novel that was Twinkle, Twinkle, “Killer” Kane!, now called The Ninth Configuration into a screenplay and see if he could get it made into a movie. Surely the success of The Exorcist would help? Blatty’s screenplay was passed around various studios and he eventually found funding for the film from an unusual source, PepsiCo. Yes, the same people who make the fizzy beverage. The film had to be shot in Hungary due to the fact that PepsiCo had some blocked funds there and that they could also turn profits from the film into a Pepsi bottling plant in the country. So yeah, Pepsi funded a little-known sequel to The Exorcist.

As already covered, William Peter Blatty would go on to write and direct the rather awesome The Exorcist III. Which itself was based on his novel Legion, a sequel to his original The Exorcist novel. However, before writing and directing The Exorcist III, Blatty’s first film as a writer and director was The Ninth Configuration, which was from a screenplay based on his novel of the same name… which was re-written from his earlier novel, Twinkle, Twinkle, “Killer” Kane! Are you keeping up?

Now, The Ninth Configuration is a kind of ‘sequel’ to The Exorcist… even though it was originally written first when it was called Twinkle, Twinkle, “Killer” Kane! But how is this a ‘sequel’ the The Exorcist? Well, when William Peter Blatty was re-writing Twinkle, Twinkle, “Killer” Kane! as The Ninth Configuration, he made the main character, an astronaut called Billy Cutshaw. That name may not jump out at you because it is never used in The Exorcist. However, do you remember that scene in The Exorcist where Chris MacNeil is throwing a party and (yet to be known to be possessed by a demon) ‘ill’ Regan comes downstairs and says ‘You’re going to die up there’, before pissing on the carpet? The person she said the line to was astronaut, Billy Cutshaw. The main character from The Ninth Configuration (AKA Twinkle, Twinkle, “Killer” Kane!).

The background is that, just before Billy Cutshaw was due to go into space, he aborted the mission due to suffering from an extreme nervous breakdown. Cutshaw then committed himself to a US government insane asylum. Said asylum is the setting of The Ninth Configuration.

The big question now is… is The Ninth Configuration a good film? Well, I guess it really depends on what you expect from it. If you go into this expecting a typical The Exorcist film with demonic possessions and exorcisms, then you will most definitely end up bitterly disappointed as there is nothing like that in the film. The Ninth Configuration is more One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest than it is The Exorcist.

The insane asylum setting and its various patients are the focus here and this is not so much a horror film (though I guess that depends on your definition of horror) as it is a psychological drama. Jason Miller, who played Father Karras in The Exorcist, is in this film too, but playing a different character. Then, there are several actors in this film who would later go on to appear in The Exorcist III… playing different characters too. There are connections to The Exorcist franchise, even if the plot and story are seemingly unconnected.

As for the question of whether the film is any good? Yeah, it is. I really enjoyed it. While it is a ‘sequel’ to The Exorcist, it is completely different tonally and thematically. But, I liked that. I like that the universe in which The Exorcist exists, that there are other things going on. It’s not all about demonic possession and spewing up pea soup. Even so and despite The Ninth Configuration starting out as a bit of a comedic farce, it does delve into much darker themes in the second half. There is even the use of some imagery (gargoyles and such) that really would not feel out of place in The Exorcist. There are little touches here and there that make this film still feel like it is a part of The Exorcist even when it is nothing like it.

William Peter Blatty always considered this to be the true sequel to The Exorcist, even if it has seemingly been brushed under the carpet in terms of it being part of the franchise. Box set collections of the films never include The Ninth Configuration and even the Wikipedia page on the entire Exorcist franchise doesn’t mention it, neither as a novel nor a film. But it is part of the franchise, the man who penned the first novel and wrote the screenplay for the first film has said so. Blatty always saw his books, The Exorcist, The Ninth Configuration and Legion as being a trilogy. The film versions of his novels (two of which he directed) were always meant to be sequel and prequel to each other.

This overlooked sequel is perhaps, not exactly the sort of film that you would watch on Halloween on its own. But, watching the William Peter Blatty trilogy of The Exorcist, The Ninth Configuration and The Exorcist III is still a great way to enjoy the scary season.