I love horror movies. They comfort me. Sometimes, they purge some of the terrors that are embedded in my brain; seeing them onscreen brings me relief.
With Rob Zombie, hero-torturers manipulate their victims into betraying each other, the better to break them—and then they still kill them afterwards. It’s sick, perverse. And I find it… exciting. I know all about twisted feelings.
Yet I didn’t expect William Friedkin’s The Exorcist to remind me of my mother.
Ha ha, the film with the girl who vomits on a priest? It reminds her of her mother? Good one!
Well, no… it’s something rather subtle that caught my attention. The uneasiness came out of the blue, triggered by… a tone of voice.
In the scene in question, the young girl opens a drawer by the sheer force of her possessed mind.
Unshakable, the priest asks her, “Did you do that?”
“Hahahhh.” [In a mocking tone, bordering on provocation.]
“Do it again.”
“In time.”
“No, now.”
“IN TIME!” [In a nasty, ruthless tone that hit me like a blow to the brain.]
In an attempt to describe my feelings accurately, I looked up the scene on YouTube.
Surprise! The tone didn’t match my recollection. I was sure, however, and stuck to my guns. Eventually, I discovered that there had been two French dubbings of the original movie, one in 1974 and another in 2001.
Phew.
Again, this haunting need to prove, including to myself, that I’m not making things up.
