The Exorcist: Book vs. Movie
William Friedkin's 1973 film The Exorcist adapts William Peter Blatty's book, with Blatty also writing the screenplay. Ellen Burstyn plays a mother seeking help for her daughter's increasingly disturbing behavior.
From Books Adapted
What changed from the book
The book gives the murder investigation much more space
William Peter Blatty adapted his own novel for the movie. It takes the story through the exorcism and its outcome, while greatly reducing the detective story around it.
Kinderman is one of the book’s main characters. His investigation follows possible suspects and connections that the movie spends far less time on. The household staff, particularly Karl, are part of a more extensive trail of suspicions and explanations.
That material makes the novel partly a detective story alongside Chris’s search for help and Karras’s investigation of Regan. The movie retains Kinderman and his questions, but much of the book’s work eliminating other explanations is left out.
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The novel’s final friendship was left out of the original release
The novel ends with Kinderman beginning a friendship with Father Dyer after Karras’s death. Friedkin filmed their exchange but left it out of the 1973 release, which closes with Dyer looking down the steps before walking away. The longer version released in 2000 restores the meeting.
Blatty’s concern about the ending was tied to what he intended in both the novel and screenplay. In a 1974 essay, he explained that Karras regains control and chooses to die to save Regan. He meant the ending as an act of self-sacrifice that defeats the demon, rather than evidence that it has won.
About the book and the movie
- Author
- William Peter Blatty
- Year
- 1971
- Pages
- 400Buy book
- Audiobook length
- 12 hr 51 minGet audiobook
- Narrator
- Eliana Shaskan
Actress Chris MacNeil seeks medical help when her daughter Regan's behavior becomes frightening and inexplicable. As tests fail to provide an answer and a suspicious death draws police attention to the household, Chris approaches Damien Karras, a priest and psychiatrist struggling with his faith. Karras must decide whether the evidence warrants an exorcism, despite his doubts about both possession and himself.
- Director
- William Friedkin
- Writer
- William Peter Blatty
- Year
- 1973
- Runtime
- 2 hr 2 minWatch on Amazon
- Cast
- Ellen Burstyn, Max von Sydow, Lee J. Cobb, Kitty Winn
- Genre
- Drama, horror, Mystery, satanic, supernatural horror, Thriller
- IMDb
- View on IMDb
Actress Chris MacNeil watches her daughter Regan develop terrifying symptoms that repeated medical examinations cannot explain. Desperate for help, she approaches Damien Karras, a priest and psychiatrist whose own faith is faltering. As events in the girl's bedroom grow more violent, Karras must consider whether an exorcism can accomplish what medicine has failed to do.
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