Review - The Last Exorcism

Since the greatest exorcism based film has been already made, to make a film about exorcism would be almost bordering on madness. It will always be compared to it and for this film to stand on its own two feet; it was going to have to be inventive.

Such is the case with The Last Exorcism, the doco style possession film directed by Daniel Stamm. After hearing the groan from everyone saying "Urgh...A found footage/hand held footage film...boo!" Fear not, there is very little shaky cam and plenty of still tracking shots where you can see the action. Firstly a quick plot breakdown for you -

Reverend Cotton Marcus (Patrick Fabian) takes a documentary crew on what is to be his last exorcism, something he doesn't believe in and does for money and is looking to expose as a fraud. Summoned by the Sweetzer family for help the Reverend and crew turn up to Sweetzer family farm and Cotton comes face to face with some hard truths and finds a girl in need of his help.

That is the film in a nutshell, only it has quite a few twists in there. Firstly is the Sweetzer's daughter Nell, really possessed or just in need a psychiatric evaluation? Is the faith-filled father the real problem? These are the questions asked by the Rev. Cotton when he encounters Nell but as things get stranger and more threatening; it appears all is not what it seems.

The film would fall totally flat if it wasn't for Patrick Fabian's amazing turn as the charismatic yet faithless preacher turned exorcist. His slick salesman ship/evangelist style theatrics and then later his genuine concern for Nell, fully fleshes out his character as a faithless yet loving family man.

The other main character is the affected Nell (Ashley Bell). The innocent looks she gives, and the equally evil looks are great and then there is the contortions’, all done by Ashley herself with no CGI and no makeup. Just like Fabien, if Bell doesn't fully commit here, the film falls down but she does a great job.  

The film is well done, as I said before not too much shaky hand held camera shots but there are a few moments of musical score which really take away from the films feel, which is a shame as the film itself could stand up without it.

A bat-shit crazy ending will and has polarised audiences but it leaves more questions than answers and in a film that is essentially about faith and what you believe, it ends on suitable note.