"The Last Exorcism Part 2": The Trailer and Thoughts

The much anticipated sequel to the 2010 faux-documentary film “The Last Exorcism” is finally coming out this March. Love or hate the found-footage genre in horror movies today, it did take a relative simple storyline -that of a lost faith preacher as he tries to prove that the way that people take god is WAY to seriously and that they would follow someone off a cliff who had a good enough spiel (Jim Jones anyone?). The first film -for those of you have not seen it- followed Reverend Cotton Marcus (Patrick Fabian) as he tried to “exorcize” a demon from the body of a young girl.

Now the whole first half of the movie paints the picture that this girl, Nell (Ashley Bell), is not in fact possessed, by in reality suffers from metal problems and is possibly being molested, if not by her father, then, definitely her brother if not by both. However, Nell’s father comes off as a confused man living in the backwoods of Louisiana, and suffers his own metal problems, in addition with his deep seated beliefs, as he tries to deal with the death of his wife and raise his family from the evils of the world when he is convinced that his daughter is in fact possessed because she has wild mood swings and has supposedly been eviscerating the live stock on the farm.

As Cotton Marcus goes through the motions, for not only Nell’s father, Louis (Louis Herthum), but for the documentary crew as well, strange things start to unfold leading to the fact that Marcus begins to rediscover his faith as he starts to think that Nell might actually be possessed by the demon, Abalam. As the facts of the case start to unfold we learn of a large conspiracy that involves the local church as well as Nell’s brother, Caleb. Leading to a confrontation of what looks to be actually a demon. The confrontation, as a result, also leads to the death of the crew and possibly Cotton Marcus.

Flash forward now to the sequel entitled: “Last Exorcism 2”, producers Eli Roth and the gang at STRIKE have now dumper the found-footage, POV style of filming and have gone the route of the traditional film as we find Nell somewhat safe and sound living in a halfway house in New Orleans. Nell seems to have limited knowledge (or at least portrays herself that way) of the events that took place and how she got to where she is (according to the trailer), but she knows that she is being perused by forces unknown.

While a lot of the movie goers that saw the first film were less than impresses, I in fact was a fan of the film. I thought that “The Last Exorcism” made good use of a style of filmmaking that has, over the years, been way over done and pretty much thrown into effect for movies that had very poor scripts to begin with. Like somehow using POV/Docu-style filming was going to fix the fact that their scripts sucked or they had a good idea and no money to get real actors that can act. Now I am not saying that they needed big or known names. Just people that had acting chops and not just a buff body or a nice pair of tits.

The trailer for “The Last Exorcism 2” has me interested to see where they can take this storyline. While the message boards do not really care for the “Christian” and religious horror films that use good and evil in the subtext of angels and demons -they may be right on some occasions- but some of the best horror films -in my mind- have used religion very effectively in the way they have created a real feel of dread in the theater. (“Omen”, “The Exorcist”, “Hellraiser” just to name few).

The fact is the horror genre will always fall on one two types of movies: The religious angle or that of the masked villain (ie Freddy, Jason, Leatherface). While both styles have been WAY over used they can and are still affective if done the right way. But each to their own.

Until next time….