You Might Have Missed the Scariest Part of 'The Exorcist' (2024)

Ask any Gen X what the scariest horror movie is, and they are likely to answer with William Friedkin’s 1973 staple, The Exorcist. This was a film that changed not only the horror movie industry but shocked and enraptured the whole of the world. What was it that made The Exorcist so special? The story was ground zero for the popularity of possession plotlines. Following the possession of 12-year-old Regan, played by Linda Blair, The Exorcist heavily relied on special effects makeup and practical effects to convey the gravity of the on-screen horror. However, as revealed in his 2023 Vanity Fairy interview, Friedkin notes how Alain Resnais’ films inspired him to include subliminal imagery to elevate The Exorcist’s tone of terror. Spliced-in clips and sounds that don’t belong in the scene appear throughout the film, sometimes caught by the audience, sometimes not. Regardless of whether a viewer consciously catches these flashes of horror, the subconscious brain does.

The Iconic Demon Was Just a Makeup Test

The horror of The Exorcist was so visually groundbreaking that the film is frequently credited by academics as having been a source of inspiration during the 1970s Satanic Panic. The now iconic demon that functionally haunts the film, spliced in as a brief clip during Father Karras’ dream of his mother and during Regan’s writhing fit on the bed, has been revealed to be a makeup test. Two or three stills of Eileen Dietz, Linda Blair’s stunt double, from a failed makeup test were inserted into the dream scene. Some audience members missed it, others delighted in trying to catch the split-second image on repeat viewers.

The stills show Dietz in ghastly white face paint, with sunken, red eyes and yellowed teeth. Framed by darkness, Dietz certainly looks unholy in the stills. Dick Smith, affectionately referred to as, “The Godfather of Make-Up,” put together Ditez’s look. Credited for experimenting with foam latex pieces for full-face masks to allow actors a better range of motion, this trial and error clearly paid off with Dietz. As she growls at the camera, her jaw swings wildly, and her eyebrows menace. She is able to focus on each facial twitch to terrorize the audience fleetingly.

How Subliminal Messaging Impacted ‘The Exorcist’

The wedged-in clip of Dietz and the sound of buzzing bees when none are present in a given scene are still part of the contemporary dialogue surroundingThe Exorcist. Friedkin cites Resnais as an inspiration for the subliminal messaging, noting how he used the slow, naturalistic establishing shots broken up by black-and-white images of corpses to be “a knockout.” He took this model and tweaked it for The Exorcist. Rather than allowing the audience to fully see Dietz in her makeup, the clip is blink-and-you’ll-miss-it fast. While the effect may go over some audience members' heads, for those who do see it, the fleeting nature of it only adds to the disorienting, otherworldly, and deeply unsettling feeling of watching The Exorcist.

The creepiness of Dietz’s makeup combined with the broken-up scene generates a tone of dread. The sound design of insects buzzing is eerie and unsettling. Every time it plays, the audience is clued in that something is about to go wrong. There is a sense that The Exorcist, as a film, is haunted. Some theories, from both fans and detractors, believe Satanic influences were at work behind the scenes of the movie. The overwhelming, crushing terror that The Exorcist inspires is, in part, due to its expert incorporation of subliminal messaging.

Friedkin had no great agenda to push, nor was he trying to sell a product; he was simply trying to compose a genuinely scary movie. His use of subliminal messaging through splicing in clips of Dietz’s makeup test and playing the hum of insects keeps the audience permanently tense. There is a double assault on anyone watching The Exorcist. On one front, they are accosted by all the violent imagery associated with demonic possession. On the other, there is the subtle editing meant to inspire dread. Friedkin was not the first to use subliminal messaging in his movie, but he did launch the phenomenon into popular usage with his brilliant execution.

The Exorcist

R

Horror

Supernatural

When a young girl is possessed by a mysterious entity, her mother seeks the help of two Catholic priests to save her life.

Release Date

December 26, 1973

Director

William Friedkin

Cast

Ellen Burstyn , Max Von Sydow , Linda Blair , Lee J. Cobb

Runtime

122 minutes

Main Genre

Horror

Writers

William Peter Blatty

The Exorcist is available to stream on Max.

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