Fortieth Anniversary of the Horror Classic "The Exorcist "

When I read that this year is the 40th anniversary of the The Exorcist, I had to check just to be sure the math is right. Sure enough, The Exorcist is a 1973 U.S. horror flick. It was directed by William Friedkin and adapted by William Peter Blatty (won an Oscar) from his bestselling 1971 novel The Exorcist. Ellen Burstyn, Max von Sydow, Linda Blair, and Lee J. Cobb are the stars, with Blair playing the role of a lifetime as the teenage girl who is possessed by the Devil. Ellen Burstyn plays her mother, and von Sydow is the priest who performs the exorcism on Blair. This was potent subject matter at the time, although I contend the only real Devils were the ones laughing all the way to the bank. That same year I was in Mexico, and the folks there didn't know what I was talking about. Anyway, I didn't watch The Exorcist until years later at the drive-in theater, and by then, it was just another gory horror flick. Ellen Burstyn is a top notch actress who deserved better roles than this one. IMDb.com rates The Excorcist with a 8.0/10.0 which is a pretty high score by their standards. So, in honor of Halloween, we have The Exorcist as one of the most enduring scary movies.