With spooky season just around the corner, many of us will be seeking the thrill of a scare at home. The most popular method to watch horror is via streaming, but there are some horror films out there that are known for all the wrong reasons. One classic that got itself a sequel has been labelled “one of the worst films” of all time, and it even stars Hollywood royalty. Oscar-winning horror flick The Exorcist cemented itself as one of the greatest scary films ever, but the second film turned out to be a major disappointment. Exorcist II: The Heretic was released in 1977 and has a shocking score of just 10% on Rotten Tomatoes.
The synopsis reads: “Owing to his experience with exorcisms, Father Lamont (Richard Burton) is chosen by his superiors to investigate the death of Father Merrin (Max von Sydow), who died during the exorcism of young Regan MacNeil (Linda Blair). Lamont finds Regan under the psychiatric care of Dr Tuskin (Louise Fletcher). By hypnotising the girl, he is able to learn that Merrin previously exorcised the same demon from a boy in Africa. Hoping for answers, Lamont travels to Africa in search of the youth.”
On IMDb, it also holds a low score of 3.8 out of 10. It was labelled by critics as a disjointed sequel. One mild response from a review said at the time: “A movie for morons, a total cheesy rip-off that makes not one minute of coherent sense.”
Another simply said: “The stupidest major movie ever made.” Directed by John Boorman, the sequel was even labelled by the original director, William Friedkin, as a “horrible picture”.
Louise Fletcher, who had just won an Academy Award for playing Nurse Ratched from One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, was also in the film. The film broke box office records on its opening weekend as fans were desperate to see what happened after the first film.
British critic Mark Kermode also called the sequel “clearly the worst film ever made by anyone ever”. According to The Guardian, following the release of the film, the director John said: “I considered my choices. The first was to commit suicide. The second was to defect to Russia.”
Eventually, the follow-up became a huge flop and acquired so much criticism that Boorman later disowned it.
A third movie in the Exorcist film franchise, The Exorcist III: Legion, was released in 1990 and would later gain a huge cult following.