Exorcist: The Beginning
Renny Harlin's 2004 prequel, with a young Father Merrin at a buried church in Kenya.
Exorcist: The Beginning is a 2004 American supernatural horror film directed by Renny Harlin, a prequel to The Exorcist (1973) and the fourth film in the series. Stellan Skarsgard, Izabella Scorupco and James D'Arcy star.
Quick Facts
- Director
- Renny Harlin
- Screenplay
- Alexi Hawley
- Story
- William Wisher; Caleb Carr
- Based on
- Characters, William Peter Blatty
- Producer
- James G. Robinson
- Starring
- Stellan Skarsgård
- Izabella Scorupco
- James D'Arcy
- Cinematography
- Vittorio Storaro
- Editing
- Mark Goldblatt; Todd E. Miller
Facts from the source article.
Background
In Cairo in 1949, a young Lankester Merrin has lost his faith after being forced by a Nazi officer to take part in executions in a Dutch village during the war, and works as an archaeologist. A collector named Semelier asks him to recover an ancient relic of a demon from a Byzantine church being dug up at Derati in British Kenya, a church built long before Christianity reached that part of Africa. Merrin finds it perfectly preserved, as if buried as soon as it was finished, with its angel statues pointing their spears down as if holding something beneath; its builders never meant it to appear in Vatican records. The film was remade from Paul Schrader's nearly finished Dominion, which Morgan Creek feared would fail, with more scares and gore. Released by Warner Bros. on August 20, 2004, it was panned by critics and grossed over $78 million on a $50 million budget.
More in Story Arcs & Timeline
Elsewhere in The Exorcist
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