The Exorcist III (1990)

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General		Extras
Category	Horror	Main Menu Audio Theatrical Trailer
Rating
Year Of Production	1990
Running Time	105:19
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL (46:23)	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	2,4,5	Directed By	William Peter Blatty
Studio Distributor	Warner Home Video	Starring	George C. Scott Ed Flanders Brad Dourif Jason Miller Nicol Williamson Scott Wilson Nancy Fish George Dicenzo Don Gordon Lee Richardson Grand L. Bush Mary Jackson Viveca Lindfors
Case	?
RPI	Box	Music	Barry De Vorzon

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) German Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) Spanish Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.78:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	1.85:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English German Spanish Swedish Norwegian Danish Finnish Polish Czech Turkish Hungarian Icelandic Croatian French Italian English for the Hearing Impaired German for the Hearing Impaired	Smoking	Yes
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    A critical and commercial diaster, The Exorcist II: The Heretic, appeared to be the last Exorcist movie. However, after the passing of many years, the original author of the Exorcist novel, William Peter Blatty, managed to revive the franchise with The Exorcist III.

    As I wrote in a previous review, "released in 1973, the Academy Award winning The Exorcist was a critical and commercial success. Even recent polls still list it as being one of the "scariest movies ever made". But The Exorcist was much more than that. With an excellent script, based on a great novel (and a true story), and a movie that exhibited superb direction, acting, photography, editing, art direction, and special/make-up effects, The Exorcist remains a brilliant movie and an absolute 'corker' of a DVD (I'm referring to he digitally remastered The Exorcist: The Version You've Never Seen). Even though grossly vulgar and crude at times, the movie was stylish and classy (never B Grade), and featured unforgettable and startling visual and aural imagery . . . As a movie, The Exorcist II: The Heretic lacked the style and substance of its predecessor. As a DVD, it also lacks the beautifully restored transfer and the English Dolby Digital 5.1EX audio of its predecessor. Indeed, it's just downright disappointing all-round".

    Made almost twenty years after The Exorcist, The Exorcist III reprises the characters of Lt. William 'Bill' Kinderman (George C. Scott) and Father Joseph Kevin Dyer (Ed Flanders), but with new actors in the roles. Jason Miller returns in an all-too-brief appearance as Father Damien Karras, but there is no Regan (Linda Blair) or Father Merrin (Max Von Sydow) to be seen. Based on William Peter Blatty's novel Legion, and written and directed by Blatty himself, The Exorcist III has actually very little to do with the events of The Exorcist. Indeed, it is a completely separate story, and I wonder if this movie would have been green-lit at all without the tie-in to a commercially successful movie.

    The plot of The Exorcist III is a simplistic detective story, tarted up with some supernatural elements: Kinderman is investigating a series of gruesome murders which resemble the work of an executed serial killer, The Gemini Killer (Brad Dourif). His investigations lead him to the disturbed ward in a local hospital. In this ward Kinderman is startled by what (and who) he finds . . .

    Strangely, Blatty has taken a few liberties with his original Exorcist story and film. For example, now Kinderman and Karras are presented as having been best friends, whereas the two characters only met briefly in The Exorcist before Karras' untimely 'death'. The changes made are not crucial to the story, but will leave some Exorcist fans, like me, scratching their heads.

    If The Exorcist II: The Heretic was flogging a dead horse, then The Exorcist III is flogging its decomposed remains.

Video

    The transfer is quite decent overall, and presented in an aspect ratio of 1.78:1, 16x9 enhanced.

    The sharpness is good. For example, consider the detailed and textured shot of Kinderman's face at 13:46. However, the shadow detail is variable, and often poor such as at 37:08. The colours are excellent, and colour is used effectively in the story-telling.

    There are no problems with MPEG or film-to-video artefacts, but tiny film artefacts appear throughout. There is some very slight telecine wobble on occasion, such as at 24:02

    The English subtitles are simplified, but accurate.

    This is an RSDL disc, with a slight pause during the layer change at 39:38.

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    While not matching the aural intensity of the beautifully digitally remastered The Exorcist: The Version You've Never Seen, there is a decent audio mix here.

    There are three audio options on this DVD: English Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s), German Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s), and Spanish Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s). The English version is the default audio.

    There are no problems with either the dialogue quality or the audio sync.

    The musical score is credited to the Barry Devorzon, and it is minimal but effective. Having been left out of The Exorcist II: The Heretic, Mike Oldfield's Tubular Bells also makes a welcome return.

    The surround sound mix is very subtle and very stereo-surround like, but there are some gently enveloping effects such as the rain through the rears at 48:17. The subwoofer is called upon frequently, such as with the ominous rumbles during the dream sequence at 25:22.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

    The extras are very slim.

Menu

    A simple menu.

Theatrical Trailer

    A 'teaser trailer' presented in an aspect ratio of 1.78:1 16x9 enhanced, with Dolby Digital stereo-surround audio.

    The Exorcist III has been previously released in R1.

    The Region 4 DVD misses out on:

• French stereo audio

    The Region 1 DVD misses out on:

• Dual layered disc
• German and Spanish Dolby Digital 5.1

    While the features are similar, I would favour the R4 for the dual-layered disc.

   The Exorcist III promises a lot, but delivers little. While there are a few scares here and there, the overall film seems to meander, lacking tension, purpose, and even a coherent storyline.

    The video quality is reasonable.

    The audio quality is good.

    The extras are really not worth mentioning.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall