THE EXORCISM OF EMILY ROSE


Scott Derriskson
2005

Is the supernatural real? For some films, the audience is asked to accept the existence of the supernatural. Others, like this one, ask the members of the audience to make a decision themselves

This is not really a horror film, it is more a philosophical courtroom drama.

Opposing sides:

DA (Ethan Thomas- Campbell Scott) – rationalism; factual; empirical. Defense attorney (Erin Bruner – Laura Linney) - anti-rational: no facts, just opinions; room for alternate explanations. The DA attempts to take events and interpret them relative to science, while the defense attorney tries to show alternate but less acceptable perhaps supernatural explanations.

This raises the question of alternative explanations to events. These events with their interpretations fall into a theory formulated by Ken Pike called the “emic-etic theory” in which the etics are events and emis are the perceptions of them.

 Witnesses

The prosecutor has medical scientists while the defense has a social scientist. The judge allows testimony the DA call “silly” since it supports “scientifically” the position of the other side.

The anthropologist’s explanations explains the manifestations which happen to (and perhaps by) Emily, but not things happening around her, which we see.

 The role of experience.

We do not experience the supernatural in the film, but only hear it reported. A report might say the people were in the room, but the film, when it shows the room has to imbue it with all manner of characteristics not necessarily in the description. Hence we “see” things perhaps in a more complete way than the testimony would allow.

Since we do not experience them directly, but only through testimony, we are put in the position of being the jury – that is we must conclude from what we have heard (seen?) whether we think the supernatural exists or not. We are also asked to judge science (rationalism) and whether belief systems must be taken into account. The jury makes a decision and a recommendation.

Film Techniques:

The “battle” between the forces of darkness and light are seen in both the use of light and the use of color

A good deal of darkness in the shots with small areas lit. Not quite Rembrandt lighting.

Color is important. There is a good deal of use of red in the lightening during the scenes dealing with the contact with the supernatural. White also seems to indicate purity in terms of clothing and also the fact that the film has several “white outs” rather than “fades to black”. The house is light colored, there is a white snow (even the still photo at the start of the DVD shows snow covered fields.

There is much hand held camera work – especially in scenes when the possession is taking place.

 The film sets up one of the basic subtexts of supernatural films: an argument between rationalism and anti-rationalist approaches which may be seen currently as a post modern and anti-post modern argument. Are there cold hard facts, or just warm soft theories and belief systems? Post modernism questions the supremacy of any one theory over another (generally calling the dominant one “privileged”). Post modernism is very interesting in its use of words.

The battle between the forces of rationalism (empiricism) and anti-rationalism is a major focus of subtexts in the supernatural film area.

Click here for a video of the actual exorcism tape of Emily Rose (actually Anneliese Michel).