Boorman and the Devil
The devil's in the fascinating details in David Kittredge's excellent new documentary BOORMAN AND THE DEVIL.
As the tagline on the poster says, "Every artist has his demon".
Director John Boorman's almost ended his career when he took on 'Exorcist II: The Heretic" in 1977.
With unprecedented access, trust among the participants and enjoyable depth, Kittredge unveils the history behind one of the most anticipated & hated films of the 20th century.
Through archive footage, behind the scenes reels and news clips, Kittredge educates on just how ground shaking "The Exorcist" was at the time. It wasn't just a hit film, it was part of American culture at every turn.
Warner Bros is anxious for what they see as a surefire sequel hit.
Boorman, hot off his recent box office blockbuster "Deliverance" is pursued to take on the film.
It's fascinating to see clips and stories of Boorman's film hits and misses of the 60's, including the avant garde, absolutely mad Lee Marvin thriller, "Point Blank" in 1967. Psychedelic, non-linear and just plain bonkers, that film should have been a clue to where Boorman would go with his take on the sequel, with style far more screen-forward than any desire to convey a coherent plot.
But the mainstream success of his thrilling dramatic weekend-from-hell thriller "Deliverance" in 1972 got the attention of the studio.
They must have ignored his next film in 1974, "Zardoz" a bizarre, dark futuristic film with Sean Connery running around in a mankini with bandolero guns while massive floating heads fly overhead, shouting "The penis is evil!"
To say "Zardoz" is an acquired taste is to be kind. Some find it artful, I find it excruciatingly boring.
Kittredge sits down in Boorman's home and has a long, transparent, warm and honest conversation with the director. That dialogue is the cornerstone of the documentary and Kittredge dazzles with a perfect blend of new animation, clips from the films being discussed and straight on shots of Boorman talking to the camera.
Any film buff will be glued, it's like a masterclass in filmmaking.
There are expansive, new filmed interviews with stars Louise Fletcher, who's charming and funny as she details her love for Boorman and her despair as rewrites took a "great original screenplay" into the depths.
Linda Blair relates how reluctant she was to be involved, but it's impressive to see just how strongly she and her team leveraged her stardom for the sequel. She agrees with Fletcher that the movie they signed up for bears little resemblance to the final version.
Famous directors like Joe Dante (Gremlins) appear with their takes on the film and the superb Mike Flanagan (Midnight Mass, Fall of the House of Usher, Doctor Sleep and the upcoming 'Exorcist: Martyrs") is especially insightful, talking about moviegoer expectations versus the creation of art.
Boorman is always open, sometimes politely defiant and seems a tad surprised that anyone thinks his idea of "making a film that's the polar opposite of what everyone loved so much" is off track.
I remember seeing the film on a very big screen the opening Friday night in Phoenix as a teenager. Like most of the country, the film surprised me by being so damn strange that it felt like a joke. Many at the time talked about how dumb it was, but you could certainly argue that it's anything but dumb.
It's so highbrow in its approach that it just flew over everyone's heads. Boorman is trying to make a statement about goodness and purity, and we were all just there to see more heads spinning around and some great scares. There is not one scary moment in the entire movie, unless you count Richard Burton's sweaty overacting and Blair tap dancing in a scene that she details here, she absolutely hated.
So did everyone else, Linda. Not your fault.
James Earl Jones dresses up like a giant locust and spits plump cherry tomatoes onto spikes. Ned Beatty appears a a bush pilot in Africa for no apparent reason.
Kitty Wynn returns from the original and is completely wasted.
But for all the mess, there are some incredibly well crafted scenes.
Legendary Director of Photography William A. Fraker (Bullitt, Heaven Can Wait) creates some stunning sequences across the globe, including some incredible early steadicam shots flying like a locust across massive desert monuments.
Composer Ennio Morricone (The Untouhables, The Good The Bad and the Ugly) delivers a stunning, at times disturbing score that also finds one beautiful moment with "Regan's Theme" which Tarantino used in his western "The Hateful Eight".
Boorman bounced back four years later with a fantastic film, "Excalibur" a film that shared Boorman's flair for the exotic, but melded much better with the fantasy elements of the King Arthur legend.
"Exorcist II" was, at the time, the biggest budget film ever released by Warner Bros. Kittredge has a lot of fun detailing the panic of the executives when the film hit theaters to a massive opening weekend and then word of mouth killed it at an incredible pace.
The scramble that follows is an enjoyable ride.
This is an absolute dream documentary for film buffs. I loved every minute of it.
It is, by far, more fascinating than the original film.
BOORMAN AND THE DEVIL is a hell of a lot of fun and possesses everything you want to know about one of the biggest bombs of the 70's. It gets an A.
Comments