Bloodlust (1961)

Maniac hunts humans in a jungle hell!

Modeled after the plot of the famous novel The Most Dangerous Game, Bloodlust is the story of a group of teenagers vacationing in the tropics who take a boat trip to a seemingly deserted island. While exploring, they find that the island is actually inhabited by a reclusive millionaire, Dr. Albert Balleau, and his servants. The vacationers are invited to stay at Dr. Balleau's mansion where they are met hospitably, but soon they get the feeling something is not as it seems.

Dr. Balleau soon reveals his true intentions; to release the teenagers onto his property so that he may hunt them down like animals, and kill them.

Bloodlust, while not a proper slasher film, exhibits many of the same characteristics and could be considered among the proto-slasher films exemplified by movies such as Psycho and Dementia 13. Unusually graphic for its time, Bloodlust may be a campy B-movie, but it still serves up some chills as Balleau works through killing his victims, and adds them to his taxidermy collection. Wilton Graffwhos nails it in his role as Balleau the cold, calculating, nonchalant madman. Robert Reed also plays a role as one of Balleau's prey in what is one of his early pre-Brady roles. All in all, a solid B-movie thriller.

4 taxidermists out of 5
Rated PG for violence, frightening scenes.

Watch the Bloodlust trailer.

Frankenstein Reborn (2005)

Born from the flesh of corpses... And the mind of a madman. 

Demented neurosurgeon, Victor Franks, experiments on a human specimen  whose co-operation is won through promises that experiments will eventually cure his handicap. But when the specimen begins to experience disturbing visions of murders, he attempts to opt out of the experiments. Franks kills him and, with his associate, work to re-animate the corpse. Finally, the corpse rises from the dead and starts off on a grisly string of killings. 


It is often said "if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all". Well, the Frankenstein monster is pretty cool looking. There we go, now let's talk about the rest of the movie. 


Frankenstein Reborn, a very loose adaptation of Mary Shelly's original story, sports awful acting, painful dialogue, and a plot line which is as choppy and full of holes as the editing is. It strives to make up for these faults with a respectable level of gore, and random lesbian sex; standard throw-ins for filmmakers struggling to win an audience for a largely flatulent film. Unfortunately, no can do... Frankenstein Reborn still comes out nearly unwatchable. It would be really cool to see a proper modern re-make of Frankenstein, but this film isn't it. 


0.5 mad doctors out of 5
Rated 18A for strong violence/gore, sexual content, nudity, drug material and language.

Watch the Frankenstein Reborn trailer.

The Wasp Woman (1959)

A beautiful woman by day - a lusting queen wasp by night.

Janice Starlin, the aging owner of a troubled cosmetics manufacturing company, feels that her beauty is fading with age. She blames her aged appearance for her companies financial problems, and seeks out a solution.

Soon she is taken in by the promises of Eric Zinthrop, a self-styled scientist who claims to have developed an amazing age-reversing serum derived from wasp enzymes. Zinthrop's initial tests on animals appear to show positive results, so Starlin volunteers to be the first human to test the serum.

While the serum seems to work, her employees note that her demeanor is becoming increasingly unpleasant; not that she was particularly pleasant to start with. Despite this, she is happy with her youthful, vibrant appearance.

But the the eccentric pseudo-scientist, Zinthrop, get's hit by a car. Without regular injections of the serum Janice starts to undergo so unexpected side-effects, namely turning into a giant wasp!

The Wasp Woman has widely been interpreted as a social-commentary on the dangers and negativity of modern capitalist societies obsession with appearing youthful and stereotypically "beautiful". While Janice thinks her downfall will be aging, her real downfall is her lack of self esteem. Her willingness to subject herself to a potentially dangerous product in her desperate, but impossible, search for the fountain of youth, ends up turning her into a hideous killing machine. Kind of makes you think about all the carcinogens, chemicals, and dangerous UV rays that many people subject themselves to daily without a clue, or a care, in search of beauty.

Unfortunately, The Wasp Woman doesn't end up looking like she does on the cover of the movie, instead she is completely reversed with a wasp head and human body rather than the other way around. She ends up looking like a lower budget version of The Fly. Furthermore we don't really get to see her till fairly late in the movie. In other words, there is an awful lot of slow lead up before the "horror" begins.

Still, unimpressive costume and slow start aside, The Wasp Woman isn't completely terrible as far as cheesy, low budget B-movies go. The potential for a killer re-make is abundant here. As it turns out, a remake was made in 1995. Watch for a review of that in the future.

2.5 pipe-cleaner antennae out of 5
Rated PG for frightening scenes.

Watch The Wasp Woman trailer.

Jurassic Park (1993)

An adventure 65 million years in the making.

Wealthy entrepreneur John Hammond is about to open a theme park like none ever seen before. Named Jurassic Park (despite many of its inhabitants not being from the Jurassic period), Hammonds new attraction contains dinosaurs cloned from DNA from blood found in mosquitoes from the period which were encased in amber and remained intact to the present day. Among the dinosaurs are carnivores including velociraptor, and tyrannosaurus.

Now you may think that if you were going to start cloning dinosaurs you would start with the friendlier kinds first, and try out some more potentially person-eating varieties later on when you were sure it was safe. But one has to have exciting attractions to bring people out after all. Besides, all the dinosaurs are safely kept behind electrified metal fences.

At any rate, Hammond invites a lawyer (Gerrano), mathematician (Malcolm), dinosaur expert (Grant), palaeobotanist (Sattler), and his grandchildren (Tim & Lex) to come take a look at the park and its specimens before the grand opening. Things are going smoothly enough when one of Hammonds employee's, in the pay of a rival company, tries to steal samples of the dinosaur DNA and accidentally shuts down the parks security system in his effort to escape with the loot. Now the lot of them have to escape from the park while avoiding an array of hungry dinosaurs which are now essentially roaming free.

When Jurassic Park was released in 1993, it was a smash hit which was followed by an immense marketing campaign, a line of toys, two sequels, and a ride at Universal Studios. Based on Michael Crichton's best-selling novel, to date it is the 15th highest grossing film ever. It stood much higher on that list before being pushed down the list by a number of recent films.

With really cool and realistic looking animatronic dinosaurs,  memorable scenes like t-rex attacking the Jeep, the dilophosaurus attack, and the velociraptor chase, Jurassic Park earned its place as one of the greatest dinosaur movies ever made. The only question remaining is, have these guys seen it?

4.5 misguided trips to the outhouse out of 5

Rated PG-13 for intense science fiction terror.

 

Watch the Jurassic Park trailer. 

Jason X (2001)

Evil gets an upgrade.

Jason Voorhees is captured and held in a government research facility where he is studied in hopes of finding the secret to his regenerative abilities. Once Rowan, the leader of the project, proposes cryogenically freezing Jason in order to ensure that he can not strike again. But a greedy scientist, bent on profiting from discovering Jason's secrets, goes over her head and tries to have him moved for further testing. Naturally he escapes and goes on another of his signature killing sprees. Once tries to stop him, but they both end up in a a state of cryogenic suspension.

Over 400 years later, they are discovered by a team of students who descent on Earth, which is no longer inhabited, on a training mission. They thaw Once and Jason. They believe Jason to be dead, and ignore Once's warnings. Sure enough, he wakes up again and hacks his way through the entire ships security personnel, and most of the crew.

Finally he faces off with the ships android, who does a pretty convincing number on him, but he is accidentally regenerated even stronger than before. It's not looking good for the remaining survivors as they desperately scramble to stay alive and to find help before the damage inflicted by Jason destroys the ship, and those on board.

Jason X attempts to put a new twist on the Friday the 13th series in a way that is even more daring than what was done with Jason Goes to Hell. It's just a shame it failed so badly. Star Trek meets Friday the 13th just doesn't come out particularly convincingly. In the end, Jason X is more of a sci-fi action flick than a horror. Obviously it is full of Jason slashing, stabbing, and dismembering everyone in sight. But other than that it really doesn't feel like a Friday the 13th movie and may actually be not only the worst Jason movie to be made by New Line Cinema, but possibly even the worst one to be made to date.

Furthermore, Jason X completely disregards the events of its immediate predecessor, Jason Goes to Hell, in which Jason was sent to hell and met Freddy Krueger. This plot line isn't picked back up until the next movie, Freddy vs. Jason. At the same time, Jason X leaves the door open for another sequel which could take place on Earth 2, where humans had relocated to after destroying the original Earth. But at this point the probability of such a sequel seems slight considering the franchise has already gone the way of the shitty remake.


1.5 robo Jason's out of 5
Rated 18A for strong horror violence, language and some sexuality.

Watch the Jason X trailer. 

Dead Snow (2009)

Ein! Zwei! Die! 

A group of medical students go vacationing in the mountains of Norway for Easter holidays and encounter a horrifying presence. A platoon of nazi soldiers fled to these same mountains to escape the advancing Red Army which had swept through the area, liberating it from nazi oppression in the early 1940's. The nazi's somehow became zombies and lurked in the snowy mountains ever since, menacing anyone who strayed into their territory. Led by the evil general Zerzog, the nazi zombies descent upon the campers who have no choice but to fight for their survival against the flesh hungry fascists.

Dead Snow starts out as a fairly standard movie about a bunch of people going to a remote location with no idea what is in store for them. In fact one of the characters even makes a joke to that effect, which is soon made ironic when the characters start to drop like flies. For the first half of the movie, it looks like it may actually be a serious attempt at a scary zombie movie, but it soon descents into an all out orgy of gore and camp. The campers wind up slicing and dicing their way through dozen of nazi zombies who occasionally get lucky and manage to do away with one of them as well.

Dead Snow has its share of jumps towards the start and fills in the rest with enough blood and guts to keep things interesting through to the end. Not the best zombie movie out there, but far from the worst.

3 nazi zombie head stomps out of 5
Rated 18A for violence/gore, sexual content, nudity, language, frightening scenes.

Watch the Dead Snow trailer.

Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday (1993)

Evil has finally found a home.

Jason returns to Crystal Lake and falls into an ambush set up with the intention of destroying him once and for all. He is riddled with over 100 bullets and blown to pieces by grenades. But will that stop Jason? Of course not!

The supernatural origins of Jason's powers are revealed in this (intended) final installment of the Friday the 13th series. When the remaining fragments of Jason's corpse are taken to the morgue for an autopsy, his demonic spirit transfers into one of the morticians.But he can only live in a host body for a limited period of time before having to jump into a new body via a snake-like demon. Jason's real goal is to reach his only living adult relative, Jessica, through whom he may be reborn permanently.

Meanwhile, an eccentric bounty hunter warns Jessica's estranged partner, Steven, of the impending danger. Now they must race against time, and the odds, to warn Jessica. While Jason hopes to be reborn through her, she is also the only one who can destroy him.To do this, she must use a magic dagger found in the Voorhees house to stab him and send him to hell.

Finally Jason arrives at his old family home. After a lengthy and messy battle, Jessica stabs Jason and after a cheesy light show, Jason is dragged to hell by demons. The final scene shows his mask lying in the sand where he was killed, Freddy Kruegers hand suddenly bursts from the sand and pulls Jason's mask underground, foreshadowing yet another sequel that was yet to come.


Jason Goes to Hell was the first, and best, installment in the Friday the 13th series to come from New Line Cinema, which picked up the series after it was dropped by Paramount. Jason, played again by Kane Hodder, looks particularly grim in this film. While we never see his face, his mask looks melted into his face, perhaps as a result of the toxic waste he is burnt by at the end of Jason Takes Manhattan. His head looks burnt and deformed, with scraggly tufts of hair sticking out the back of it. The Jason of most of the later Paramount sequels struggled to be scary in an increasingly cheesy context which became harder and harder to take seriously. This Jason slices campers in half, melts peoples faces off in deep fryers, and just generally makes sure you know that he is not to be fucked with.


Another interesting aspect of this Jason film is the cameo appearance of the Necronomicon from the Evil Dead series. The dagger used to kill Jason also looks suspiciously like the one from Evil Dead, all of which seems to imply some sort of connection between the series which was never again mentioned or extrapolated on.

While Jason was supposed to be dead and gone for good this time, he still has a trip to space and a battle with Freddy Krueger in front of him before the franchise truly ended, only to be restarted a few years later by a fairly crummy remake. But for the time being at least, Jason's film career ends on a high note.

4 de-mustached Jason's out of 5
Rated R for strong violence and gore, and for sexuality and language.


Watch the Jason Goes to Hell trailer.

The Nightmare Ends on Halloween (2004)

Prepare for the ultimate showdown.

The Nightmare Ends on Halloween is another Blinkey Productions fan film which is set immediately after Freddy's defeat at the hands of Jason Voorhees in Freddy vs. Jason.

Freddy is now in limbo between his dream world, and hell. He meets Michael Myers, whose mind also spends its time in limbo while he is catatonic between Halloween's. Freddy tries to convince Michael to do his bidding for him in the real world. Michael refuses and turns on Freddy. They fight it out briefly before they are interrupted by Pinhead (of the Hellraiser films) who has recruited Jason and Leatherface as minions to come retrieve Freddy and bring him to hell where he belongs.

The entire film runs just over 8 minutes and is well made. Freddy's make up looks good, as do the other characters. The guy playing Freddy is a bit of an over-actor, and the battle between him and Michael is much too short and not too eventful. It's a shame this wasn't extrapolated into a longer film which could delve further into everything. On the other hand, considering how bad Freddy vs. Jason was, maybe it isn't.

2.5 slasher conventions out of 5
Unrated. Contains violence.

Watch The Nightmare Ends on Halloween.

Friday the 31st: Michael vs. Jason (2005)

Two evils meet.

Michael Myers stalks his nephew, John Tate, and his fiancee across the U.S. Unaware that they are being followed, they stop at Crystal Lake to ask for directions. There they encounter Tommy Jarvis, who is holed  up in his cabin, hiding from Jason Voorhees.

Jason soon arrives and breaks into the cabin, attacking Tommy. Michael isn't far behind, having followed John's car to the cabin. This cabin proves not to be big enough for the both of them, so the two infamous villains are left to duke it out. If they weren't too evil to work together, they would have made a killer team.

Friday the 31st is a fan film created by Blinky Productions. It runs just over 21 minutes and is surprisingly well made despite some lighting issues, and an obviously small budget. Admittedly there are a few scenes that come off as a bit odd, like when Jason just opens the door of the cabin after pounding on it for so long. Also, Tommy Jarvis looks nothing like he did in the Friday the 13th movies. On the up side, he is quite a bit less whiny and annoying than he was in the actual films, and he doesn't have that really stupid 80's haircut. A couple of parts in the fight scene between Jason and Michael incite a bit of a chuckle. Jason breaking Michael's arm just seemed really funny and out of place somehow.

Regardless, Friday the 31st is well worth the 20 minutes for any fan of these two legendary horror franchises. Chances are that this won't be the last film from Blinky to find its way onto this blog if others are of a similar caliber.

3 slasher showdowns out of 5
Unrated. Contains violence.

Watch Friday the 31st.

Friday the 13th: Jason Takes Manhattan (1989)

The Big Apple's in BIG trouble!

A boat carrying two teenagers on their way to a graduation cruise to New York accidentally raises Jason from the dead. He climbs aboard, murders the passengers, and rides the boat to the dock, where he stows away on the cruise ship. How Crystal Lake leads to Manhattan would be some interesting geography to see, but whatever.

Jason quickly begins his killing spree, knocking off the crew and the students on board one after another. One of the students, Rennie, senses that something is wrong. But she thinks it is just her imagination playing tricks on her as a result of her intense fear of water. When her boyfriends dad, who happens to be the ships captain, turns up dead the crew and passengers start to realize that everyone is in danger.

The students organize a mob to hunt down and kill the murderer, not realizing quite yet what they are up against. Jason makes short work of most of the ships inhabitants, then proceeds to sink it. The survivors escape on a life boat while Jason swims to shore to intercept them in Manhattan. Rennie, her boyfriend, her domineering guardian, her teacher, and her dog are left to fight their way through Jason, and the mean streets of New York, in hopes of surviving.

Jason Takes Manhattan is one of the worst, if not the worst, of the Friday the 13th series. Set to a painfully awful 80's pop soundtrack, this eighth installment in the franchise is a veritable cheese fest with lots of stupid gags, goofy effects, and obnoxious characters. In other words, it's back to the stylings of the fifth and sixth films. Even Kane Hodder, who does a great job as Jason in The New Blood, has a hard time being scary in such a ludicrous context. He does, however, offer up a few satisfying kills such as those of the abusive asshole foster dad, and the two attempted rapists.

If someone at Paramount thought that there was no way they could realistically bring Jason back to life for another rampage on Crystal Lake, what made them think it would work better to bring him back to life and send him to New York on a cruise ship. Wouldn't it have been easier just not to keep killing him in every movie and then trying to think up some ridiculous way to bring him back to life? Like the characters in these movies, they just never learn.

2 syringe impalement's out of 5
Rated 18A for violence, drug use, language, sexual content, nudity, and frightening scenes.


Watch the Jason Takes Manhattan trailer.

Lesbian Vampire Killers (2009)

Two no-hopers. One cursed village. One hell of a night!

Centuries ago, Baron Wolfgang MacLaren slayed the Vampire Queen, Carmilla. But before he could finish her off she placed a curse on both the Baron, and the local villagers,  whereby each of their female descendants would become a lesbian vampire on their 18th birthday.

Fast-forward to the present day; Jimmy and Fletch are two hopeless fellows who are down on their luck. Jimmy has recently been dumped by his emotionally abusive, cheating girlfriend... again. Fletch, meanwhile, has just been fired from his job as a clown for children's parties.

The two friends decide that what they need is a vacation, so they head off to the remote village of Cragwich, which just so happens to be the very same village where the Vampire Queen, Carmilla, was slain. On their journey they encounter a van full of attractive young women including the charming Lotte, and several of her fellow mythology students. They are on their way to Cragwich to study the legend of Carmilla.

Considering themselves quite lucky, Jimmy and Fletch hitch a ride to a cabin where the students are staying and begin to party it up. Things would appear to be going swimmingly, until some of their new found friends go missing. They've been turned into lesbian vampires too, and now the Vampire Queen's hench-women have even more devious plans. It turns out that Jimmy is the last remaining descendant of Wolfgang MacLaren. Using his blood, and that of the virginal Lotte, the vampires intend to resurrect Carmilla so that she may reap her revenge. Only Jimmy, Fletch, Lotte, and a very peculiar vicar, can stop them (and save themselves) before its too late.

Lesbian Vampire Killers is a tongue-in-cheek vampire comedy which uses lesbian sexuality as a gimmick to get people to watch it. The movie doesn't particularly paint a very balanced picture of lesbians. There's lots of lighthearted double entendre jokes about being "turned" which in some way might come off as reinforcing the ridiculous notion that straight people can be turned gay or lesbian through simple exposure to homosexuality. Perhaps not shockingly, it isn't a particularly pro-woman film in general for that matter. Carmilla is proclaimed to be "driven by a hatred of men and a love of women". All the female characters except Lotte are either evil, mere sex objects, or both. It's fairly clear who this movie is appealing to for its audience. Sex and gender politics, and the odd funny moment here and there aside, it was actually... still pretty bad. The real question is will they go through with making a sequel about gay werewolves?

1 milk-filled (WTF?) vampires out of 5

Rated 18A for language, sexual content and horror violence.

 

Watch the Lesbian Vampire Killers trailer. 

Friday the 13th: The New Blood (1988)

On Friday the 13th, Jason will meet his match.
 
Years after Tommy Jarvis thought he finished Jason off once and for all, Tina Shepherd, a teenage girl with telekinetic powers, accidentally frees him from his watery tomb. Jason gets right back into the swing of things, unleashing a murderous rampage upon the two nearby cabins on Crystal Lake. One cabin is housing Tina, her quack doctor, and her mother. The other is housing Jason's favourite prey, partying teenagers. Only Tina, with her supernatural abilities, can defeat Jason this time around.

The New Blood temporarily saved the Friday the 13th series from its descent into mediocrity. A lot of the things that did disservice to the last two films are gone in The New Blood. Namely, cheesy one-liners, comic relief characters, and the long played out character of Tommy Jarvis. Jason, now played by Kane Hodder, is scarier and more vicious. We also get a look at him without his mask yet again in this installment. By this point he is looking like a decaying zombie. He's seen better days... sort of. At any rate it's all irrelevant because by this point in the series it is pretty clear that he is essentially immortal and unstoppable. Of course he is temporarily stopped again at the end of the film, in way which is potentially even stupider than in Jason Lives. But putting that aside, New Blood is a return to the Friday the 13th style which made the series a success in the first place. If only it could last.

4 tree saws out of 5
Rated 18A for violence/gore, nudity/sexual content, language, drug use, frightening scenes.

Watch the New Blood trailer.

Friday the 13th: Jason Lives (1986)

Kill or be killed! 

Jason is inexplicably re-animated by a bolt of lightening after Tommy Jarvis makes the lunatic decision to unearth his coffin, believing that this will cure the Jason-related nightmares which continue to plague him. Tommy escapes narrowly with his life, and swears to destroy Jason once and for all.

Meanwhile a new camp has been opened on Crystal Lake, which has been re-named Forest Green to hide its dark past. The kids have already arrived, and counselors are settling in, unaware of the impending bloodbath.

Tommy's attempts to warn local law enforcement are met with disbelief and belligerence. But the police chiefs daughter apparently has a thing for guys who come off as raving lunatics and, after falling for Tommy, teams up with him to fight Jason.

Unfortunately, Jason Lives follows down the same path as New Blood. The whole movie has a toned down feel compared to earlier installments. Jason isn't as scary, the gore is less graphic, and the suspense is gone. At the same time there is an abundance of unnecessary comic-relief in the form of superfluous cheese characters like the paintball team, and really dumb one-liners. None of it is really funny, but it serves to lighten the movie up, in other-words, to destroy the mood and atmosphere of the film.

Presumably the move away from the more serious, scarier, and more explicit, style of the first four films was aimed at making the films more palatable to a wider audience in order to keep up with the plethora of cheese-ball slasher films of the day. The real result, however, is a much worse movie over-all, and a way less profitable one. Unfortunately most slasher movie makers didn't really seem to learn any lessons from this experience in the years that followed.

As for Tommy's attempt to finish off Jason at the end of the film... really? 

3 propellers to the head out of 5
Rated 18A for violence, sexual content, profanity, frightening scenes.


Watch the Jason Lives trailer.

Friday the 13th: A New Beginning (1985)

If Jason still haunts you, you're not alone!

 

Jason Voorhees was pronounced dead after being hacked to death by the young Tommy Jarvis at the end of Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter. Since then Tommy has grown up in a variety of mental hospitals, unable to cope with his traumatic experiences and recurring nightmares about Jason. 

 

Shortly after Tommy is moved to a halfway house, in a rural, wooded area not unlike Camp Crystal Lake. Soon a hockey mask wearing villain begins killing off the residents of the halfway house, and anyone else who happens to be in the vicinity. Has Jason returned from the grave? Has Tommy slipped into insanity and picked up Jason's legacy? Or is someone else altogether behind this new spat of grisly murders?

A New Beginning, the fifth film in the legendary Friday the 13th series, starts to show the first serious signs of weakness for franchise. While far from the worst of the sequels, it fails to provide the same jumps, the same suspense, and the same gore as its immediate predecessors. While it does contain the odd exception, it comes off as much more flat than the earlier sequels and starts off quite slow initially. Some of Jason's usual creativity does come out, but a large number of the deaths are by simple stabbing, or occur off-screen. 

Some of the characters in A New Beginning are so ridiculous or utterly obnoxious that you can't help but eagerly await their demise. The unfortunate part is that because they are so obnoxious, they take away somewhat from the enjoyment of the movie. In some of these cases, like the two rednecks, their presence in the film could have been much briefer and this could only have improved the movie over-all. 

Finally, it seems somewhat superfluous to have inserted a sequel without the actual star villain into the middle of the series. Considering how many silly ways Jason came back to life in these movies, you wouldn't imagine that anyone would have had a problem with him doing it one more time.  

 

3 dead rednecks out of 5 

Rated R for violence/gore, sexual content, nudity, language, drug use, frightening scenes.  

Watch the New Beginning trailer.

The Exorcist (1973)

Something beyond comprehension is happening to a little girl on this street, in this house. A man has been called for as a last resort to try and save her. That man is The Exorcist.

Successful actress Chris McNeil, and her daughter Regan, live a comfortable, posh, lifestyle with their two servants in their big house in Washington D.C. But their generally uneventful, and privileged,  lifestyle is about to be turned on its head.

Innocent, polite, little Regan begins to act strangely; speaking of imaginary friends, using foul language, and claiming that her bed shakes at night.

The situation rapidly deteriorates as Regan's behaviour takes a turn for the worse with violent outbursts aimed at herself and others. Chris eventually comes to believe that her daughter is becoming increasingly possessed by demonic forces.

While it seems unbelievable at first, Regan's increasing disturbing appearance and behaviour lead Chris to call on Father Karras to perform an exorcism on the head-spinning, projectile-vomiting, spider-walking Regan.

The Exorcist is widely considered one of the most frightening films ever produced. Although this widespread belief certainly has its detractors, The Exorcist is undoubtedly a creepy film which has scared the ever-living crap out of more than a few in its time.

All around, this is a fantastically made film which must have been quite a shock to movie-goers of the day. It's tone is dead serious, without an ounce of the humorous light-heartedness which characterizes so many horror movies today. Instead it's a straight-forward tale of a sweet young girl being transformed into a hideous, violent demon whose memorable abilities and pass-times include spinning her head around in a full circle, spewing puke, spider-walking down the stairs, and changing her voice dramatically for maximum spookiness. A classic, and a must see for any horror fan.

5 spinning heads out of 5

Rated 18A for strong language and disturbing images.

Watch the Excorcist trailer.