According to a survey by Fandango, the most popular Halloween costume this year for dudes is Pennywise from “It.” That’s hardly a surprise given that Stephen King‘s killer clown is now back in the spotlight thanks to runaway hit film, which has become the top-grossing horror movie all time, surpassing the classic “The Exorcist.” However, director William Friedkin has just a little quibble with that statistic.
Speaking with Indiewire, the filmmaker reveals that he actually digs the hit horror movie, but in terms of actual tickets sold, “The Exorcist” remains king.
“I thought it was a little bit over the top, but ‘It’ was really good. The clown was pretty scary stuff. I really like it. But here’s the thing. It will never have as many admissions as ‘The Exorcist’ in terms of people who came to see it,” he explained. “The price of a ticket when ‘The Exorcist’ came out was probably on average less than two dollars; I think today it’s closer to nine. Neither ‘The Exorcist’ nor any of the other films that made a lot of money will ever have as many viewers as ‘Gone with the Wind‘ or ‘Birth of a Nation.’ I think it cost 15 cents or a quarter to see. So you can’t talk about how many people saw this more than something else because of the difference in the value of money. But it’s kind of unusual for Warner Bros. to get behind a story like that because ‘The Exorcist’ has been such an important film to them. It’s the gift that keeps on giving. Still, I liked ‘It.’ I thought it was terrific.”
Well, yes, that’s true, but Friedkin seems to think by WB touting the success of “It” against “The Exorcist” it’s a slight against his movie. He should probably know more than anyone else, it’s just good marketing and PR.
Meanwhile, the director shared his thoughts on the sequels to his iconic horror, and it’s perhaps not a surprise that he hasn’t really seen or given them much regard.
“I never saw any of the ‘Exorcist’ films, not even Bill’s [William Blatty, author of ‘The Exorcist’ novel]. I saw a few minutes of ‘Exorcist II,’ but that was only because I was in the Technicolor lab timing a film that I had directed — I forget which one — and one of the color timers at Technicolor said, hey, we just made a print of ‘Exorcist II,’ would you like to have a look at it? I said OK. I went in, and after five minutes, it just blasted me. I couldn’t take it,” Friedkin said. “I thought it was just ridiculous and stupid. But that was only five minutes, so I can’t make an ultimate judgement about it. It just seemed to me to have nothing to do with ‘The Exorcist.’ ”
“I know Bill [Blatty] did one, which was not meant to be called ‘Exorcist III.’ It was from another novel he’d written called ‘Legion.’ I had no interest. I loved Bill Blatty. I dedicated my documentary to him and we remained close friends to his death. But I know that he had to make a lot of compromises — he had to put an exorcism scene in there, which he never intended, so that the producers could call it ‘Exorcist III,’ ” he added.
For what it’s worth, Friedkin hasn’t seen the TV series or “Dominion: Prequel to the Exorcist,” and it’s probably safe to say he won’t be doing that anytime soon. He also liked another big horror hit this year, “Get Out,” which he called “terrific.” Friedkin certainly has his pulse on the genre this year, but “The Exorcist” still scared the most people ever at the cinema.