The Last Exorcism

WARNING: KEEP ALL SMALL CHILDREN AWAY FROM THIS MOVIE!

If you plan on seeing this movie, it may be smart to bring a priest along.

Patrick Fabian brings to life Cotton Marcus, a minister who has lost his own faith but continues preaching to feed his family. After reading about the death of a little boy during an exorcism gone wrong, Reverend Marcus decides to retire from exorcism indefinitely. However, the good reverend gets his chance to expose exorcism for the fraud that it is when he receives a plea from a Louisiana farmer who is convinced that his sixteen year old daughter is possessed by the devil himself. To do this, Cotton brings along a camera crew to capture the moments of his last exorcism.

At first glance, The Last Exorcism may look and sound like any other horror movie, especially to those who are familiar with any other movie about exorcism, but it has its own, unique feel. Yes the shaky cam is reminiscence of The Blair Witch Project and exorcism is nothing new to fans of the horror genre, but this movie takes both of those concepts and makes them feel new. In other words, this movie isn't boring.

As I said, this movie feels fresh. This can be contributed to all the great performances we see in this film. Ashley Bell does a terrific job bringing her character to life and making the supposed "possession" seem so real. In fact, Bell's performance is probably the scariest aspect of this film. Patrick Fabian also does a wonderful job at creating empathy for the reverend. This movie is more centralized around the main character than a lot of its predecessors and Fabian does a wonderful job at holding it all together.

I have been asked many times if this movie is scary and I always answer by saying, "It's an Eli Roth film." The Last Exorcism is a great horror flick because it always keeps its audience on edge; you never quite know what is going to happen next and it keeps you guessing until the very end. However, like I said earlier, this is an Eli Roth film so it pretty much borders on R and is probably too gory and too intense for any thirteen year old that I know.

The Last Exorcism is a great horror flick for those of you who are into that kind of thing. It produces legitimate scares without sacrificing the storyline and always has the audience engaged in what is happening.

See it.