Dominion: Prequel to the Exorcist

As I had stated yesterday in my review of “Exorcist: The Beginning,” plans were made for a prequel to the series that spawned many issues. The original director for this prequel, John Frankenheimer, got really sick so Paul Schrader took over until the studio executives found his version not scary enough, so Renny Harlin took over the director’s chair. It’s really rare for a case like this to happen, so it’s somewhat surprising that Schrader was able to finish off his film so that people could see how it differed from Harlin’s film.

One year after Harlin’s prequel (2005), Schrader released his prequel to the series, “Dominion: Prequel to the Exorcist.” How is this film compared to Harlin’s? Well, only one way to find out.

Schrader, much like how Harlin did, wanted to develop Father Merrin’s character, since he played a very large part in the original Exorcist movie. Schrader’s version took a very old school horror movie approach than a lot of the horror movies we have seen. Sadly, this movie moves slowly for it to develop anything similar to “The Exorcist.” Sure, the film used the exact same sets as Harlin’s version, but a lot of it looks like a character’s drama than a horror movie.

Father Merrin is once again played by Stellan Skarsgard, but this time, the film is a polar opposite of Harlin’s version. The beginning is the same, when Father Merrin had a traumatic experience in Holland with Nazi soldiers. End result? It’s the exact same thing as Harlin’s version where Merrin lost his faith, but this time instead of not believing in God, he doesn’t believe in Satan's home and Satan himself. What in the world is going on here? Now he takes the job as an archeologist on a task to look at an abandoned church. This is beginning to sound a lot like Harlin’s version, but then again Schrader was booted off the film and Harlin restarted everything from scratch. Since this is a huge deal for the church, they send Father Francis, played by Gabriel Mann, to set up a follower among the area’s prehistoric people. At the site, a handicapped boy named Cheche, played by pop singer Billy Crawford, sees the dig site carefully, and Merrin gives Cheche his word that he will help Chechce. A Pagan temple is found buried below the church and when it’s violated, that’s when the evil comes out, as it starts to infect the people and the army is sent to see what is going on.

The set up for this film is quite interesting, but like I had mentioned already, it just drags on making it a bore. An hour into the movie, Satan makes his appearance and we finally get to see something related to “The Exorcist.” It’s not like in the last prequel where a girl was in the traditional makeup from the original film, but not in any way scary from the first time. However, it’s nice that they decide to switch it up, but it’s hard to say whether that’s for the better or for the worse. Even though the character development and exposition is a little boring, it does get better after the climax. The change to what fans are familiar with would have been a breath of fresh air if the part of Merrin starting to face Satan didn’t look really silly.

Maybe if Schrader wrote this movie, it probably wouldn’t have been this silly. He did say no to “Raging Bull” and “Taxi Driver” for Martin Scorsese. The good thing is that even though the writing is very poor, the performances by Skarsgard and Gabriel Mann make up for it. In some scenes, they can rise above the poor writing. Both show very well how much a clergy has to struggle in order to deal with a situation that doesn’t fall into the normal views of religion and faith. Clara Bellar as the village nurse and concentration camp survivor doesn’t really do that well of a job here, and the romance in this version looks forced.

The main problem with this movie is the CGI and Green Screen Effects, which are at best from a novice point of view and worst when they are just plain silly. You would think that Schrader rushed to finish this film, leaving you to think if he didn’t hire an effects team to edit everything together. The hyenas that show up at the dig to protect the place obviously look fake and the effects used at the end fight between Merrin and Satan are much worse. Then there are scenes that just look absolutely gross, like the woman giving birth to the maggot covered baby, an event that would have been a shock if it had a lasting effect on the village. However, the stupidest thing is that they never mention it again. Edward Douglas comments, “Most of the scenes are over-scored with non-stop music from Trevor Rabin and Angelo Badalamenti.” I will give them credit for setting up the mood and tone for those scenes. There are times when they could have just taken a break from the over use of their music.

Final verdict: these two prequels is like a pick your poison deal. If you want to watch a film where a man loses his faith, religion and God, Harlin’s version is the one for you. However, if you want your film to be about a man who loses his belief in Satan, then you’ll prefer Schrader’s version. I personally thought these two prequels were not well done and were a cluttered mess, as you could see from my reviews. I would also give this film a 2, since I can’t decide on which one is better than the other. They are both extreme on both ends of the spectrum. At least they are watchable compared to "Exorcst 2."

Well, that concludes my review on “The Exorcist Series.” It started off great, went into an awful sequel, came back in the third installment, then two directors told their version of a prequel, which didn’t work and failed on both accounts. Stay tuned tomorrow when I pick up another franchise for “Halloween Month.”