Need a Quick Answer about the Exorcist. Please

[The Mystery Machine]

I am very confused. I have seen this movie twice and don't remember anything about an Ouiji board. We ARE talking about the Linda Blair "Exorcist" aren't we?

Yes, it is in the beginning. She chats with "Mr. Howdy" in her basement with the Ouiji board.

 

[simpilotswife]

Just wanted to throw out a couple of things here.....

One is that I thought I read somewhere years ago that the Ouija board got it's name from the French "oui" and German "ja" words for Yes (referring to one of the answers on the board).

Also interestingly enough in the book when Regan first presented with symptoms her team of doctors thought she was hyperactive and prescribed Ritalin to her. Her movement of the furniture was believed to have been caused by the kinetics of hyperactivity.

 

[Andy B]

What is a 'Social' horror film?

 

[DawnCt1]

What is a 'Social' horror film?

A film that exploits the social anxieties of the day. For example, The 1975 version of the Stepford Wives. It was at the height of the women's movement and so the film used masculine fears that women were "not feminine" anymore, and the feminine fears that women had to be kept in a role. It was creepy in 1975 but by the time the 2004 version of the Stepford Wives came out, they had to use comedy to make the movie and still it wasn't very successful. They also had to add a twist; where Claire, one of the wives was in on the conspiracy to create robots and in fact, she had created one for herself, her husband. In the USA, the Exorcist was a very frightening movie but, according to Stephen King, it did not work as well in Germany because they were more concerned about bomb throwing radicals than foul mouthed teenagers. I would also speculate that Germany is a more secular society, so demons and religion isn't one of their main anxieties.

 

[DawnCt1]

What is a 'Social' horror film?

"Carrie" is another good example of a social horror film. Where as The Stepford Wives is more about what men want from women, Carrie is about women finding ways to channel their own power and what men fear about women's sexuality.

 

[salmoneous]

Carrie is about women finding ways to channel their own power and what men fear about women's sexuality.

I though Carrie was about women HATING PROM (which seems to still be a real emotion.)

Or maybe the fear your girlfriend will catch you cheating and trash your truck

 

[DawnCt1]

I though Carrie was about women HATING PROM (which seems to still be a real emotion.)

Or maybe the fear your girlfriend will catch you cheating and trash your truck

Carrie is about a girl who was sadly mistreated as a teenager by her peers, or as Stephen King puts it, "in that pit of man and woman eaters that is your normal suburban high school and like Samson, she feels her power and pulls the temple down". But you knew that.

 

[CPT Tripss]

Social horror had me wondering.
I guess one of my favorites, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, fits here . . . the evils of McCarthyism.
as well as all the "great" mutant monsters wreaking Japanese cities.

 

[Laugh O. Grams]

Social horror had me wondering.
I guess one of my favorites, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, fits here . . . the evils of McCarthyism.
as well as all the "great" mutant monsters wreaking Japanese cities.

How about Dawn of the Dead and it's take on mindless American consumerism?

 

[mickeylove2]

Back to the Exorcist...anyone seen the deleted scenes where Reagan does the "spider walk" down the stairs?? Talk about creepy! The director has said that one of the reasons they didn't put that in the movie itself was becasue Linda Blair actually DID that and with all that went on with the movie, they decided to leave that scene out! I highly recommend getting the Directors version and watching the extras!!!

 

[Laugh O. Grams]

Back to the Exorcist...anyone seen the deleted scenes where Reagan does the "spider walk" down the stairs?? Talk about creepy! The director has said that one of the reasons they didn't put that in the movie itself was becasue Linda Blair actually DID that and with all that went on with the movie, they decided to leave that scene out! I highly recommend getting the Directors version and watching the extras!!!

I thought they hired a gymnast to do that stunt...

 

[mickeylove2]

I thought they hired a gymnast to do that stunt...

O, maybe I heard wrong...I don't know for sure!

 

[RickinNYC]

And Halloween is a social horror movie representative of the sexual freedom that young teenagers were expressing in the 70's, much like Friday the 13th in 1980. And The Thing was reminiscent of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, but for the Reagan generation. Most horror movies are simply entertainment, but quite a few are mirrors of society's expression of the times.

George Romero is hugely popular for doing that starting with Night of the Living Dead with race wars, Dawn of the Dead and mindless consumerism, Day of the Dead and it's take on the military and Land of the Dead is particularly heavy on the symbolism and in-your-face response to the current times.

Gotta love horror movies! LOVE 'EM!

 

[DawnCt1]

Social horror had me wondering.
I guess one of my favorites, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, fits here . . . the evils of McCarthyism.
as well as all the "great" mutant monsters wreaking Japanese cities.

Actually, The Thing, The Blob, the Body Snatchers, coming in the 1950's and at the end of WWII had nothing to do with MCCarthyism. It had everything to do with the "Appeasers". With Neville Chamberlain and his promise that the Nazis would not invade, America was very wary of appeasers. The films at the time marched out a cadre of scientists and we all know their lines; "We must preserve the creature for science and if it comes from a society more advanced than ours, it has come in peace" In all of these films, the military, like in WWII, comes to save the day. Things changed following the Viet Nam war in the 1970s. Close Encounters of the Third Kind made the scientist a hero and told the military to stay away.

 

[DawnCt1]

Gotta love horror movies! LOVE 'EM!

One of the first horror movies that I saw and I remember I was really little, was the black and white version of Village of the Damned. It was made in 1960. Christopher Reeves remade it in 1995. It was about a village whose women were all impregnated at the same time and had tow headed children with scary eyes that could read minds and kill. I wonder what the social mindset was regarding children in 1960. Of course horror to be successful steps just over that taboo line and I remember the movie being really creepy at the time. Conversely, Godzilla movies never frightened me. I always felt sorry for the monster.

 

[DawnCt1]

How about Dawn of the Dead and it's take on mindless American consumerism?

In 1978 "the mall' was a "relatively" new shopping concept and that certainly seems like an appropriate theme that you hit on.

 

[simpilotswife]

Monroeville Mall actually opened in 1969. It was the best and largest Mall in the Pittsburgh area at that time. I remember being envious of the people ice skating there, it looked so cool.

 

[Bella the Ball 360]

Well....in the Catholic religion there are respected "Exorcists". They have the gold standard checklist for possession, miracles, etc...

So it is just that it is their level of expertise, esp. back in the time that it happened.

You have to remember that most of the world was not aware of all the primitive tribes that performed exorcism like we do today.

Information was lacking back then. So understand from a "time perspective" if that makes sense.

Thanks, now it makes sense to me. I was not thinking the article was 30 years old but rather something more current. I remember when I saw the priests on the old late night Merv Griffen show with the author I had NO idea what they were talking about b/c I had never even heard of exorcism. These were the priests who also had parts in the movie.