When all is said and done, “The Exorcists” could have been so much worse. And that’s about as good as it gets with Jose Prendes’ horror thriller. As is typical of “The Asylum” studios, “The Exorcists” arrives right around the time of the big reboot of the classic William Friedkin film (I’ll see your two priests and raise you five!). This new film isn’t bashful in hiding its intentions, even styling the title fonts to look similar to “The Exorcist.” Even with all the reservations, “The Exorcists” has a decent concept, but what hinders it is that the script feels painfully under developed.
Elderly Father Ryland is recruited young Father Cortez to help with an exorcism involving a young teenage girl. In Chicago, Sister Caroline tracks down Doctor Beckett, a psychiatrist, to help in the exorcism. They then go off to Miami to recruit Reverend Melody Bates to assist with the case as well. They form a group allowing for a bigger force of good against a powerful demon. Meanwhile, four twenty something teens break in to a local mausoleum after hours deciding to use a ouija board to conjure up a relative. Things soon spiral out of control, as is usually the case.
Even at eighty minutes, “The Exorcists” feels too long, and it feels like writer/director Prendes didn’t have enough of a story and tacked on a B plot to the movie. While the B plot does ultimately come full circle with the A plot, writer/director Prendes has to work really hard to rationalize why we even needed the sub-plot to begin with. And there’s not a lot of reasoning for why the B plot feels like some kind of weird take off on “Evil Dead.” Prendes brings forward a good idea about a team of priests working to battle a demon that’s possessed a young girl. I’m not too sure why they would compile a team and include a skeptic to muck up the exorcism, and I’m also not sure why the whole shebang is set in a mausoleum.
There’s not even enough of a reasonable explanation given at any point to suspend disbelief. It’s just set in a mausoleum. Prendes is a solid director who makes good use with the limited setting, all things considered. The respective cast also gives about as good a performance as they can with the script. While the narrative squeezes by without much of a hitch there are some clunky one-liners and awkward side plots that hinder any momentum the movie builds. “The Exorcists” is at least better than “The Pope’s Exorcist,” I just wish there was a lot more meat to the central plot about the team of demon fighting priests, sparing us the silly slasher movie sub-plot.