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Rev. Cotton Marcus (Patrick Fabian) tries to drive a demon from a country girl, Nell (Ashley Bell), in “The Last Exorcism.” |
Frankly, I am getting really weary of horror movies mounted as first-person pseudo-documentaries shot with nausea-inducing hand-held cameras.
Still, if there absolutely must be another one to join the ranks of “Cloverfield,” “The Blair Witch Project,” “Paranormal Activity,” the two “REC” movies and the granddaddy of them all “Cannibal Holocaust,” it might as well be Daniel Stamm’s earnest, surprising and well-acted entry “The Last Exorcism.”
It begins as a documentary about a con artist minister who seeks redemption by coming clean about his sham practice of pretending to exorcise demons — for a fee.
Then, the movie abruptly changes direction. And in the final reel, it changes direction again, and reveals what it’s really been about all along.
I did find the ending to be a slight disappointment, not just because it felt too abrupt and dramatically blunt. But because it duplicates the closing shot of another highly popular horror pseudo doc. (It’s OK to read further, there are no spoilers here.)
The Rev. Cotton Marcus (a spot-on performance by mostly TV actor Patrick Fabian) is apparently in bad need of redemption for his career of trickery that he gladly tells every secret to filmmaker Iris (Iris Bahr) and her ubiquitous cameraman.
He expresses disdain not only for himself, but for the ignorant churchgoers who fall for his dramatic incantations and carnival-show shenanigans, such as the spooky noises generated by his hidden sound system.
Then he gets a letter from a Bible-belt farmer, Louis Sweetzer (Louis Herthum), desperately imploring Marcus to exorcise his teen daughter Nell (Ashley Bell).
“The devil is inside my daughter!” Sweetzer proclaims. (Read more…)