Exorcist: The Beginning

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{{Infobox_Film |name = Exorcist: The Beginning |image = Exorcist the Beginning movie.jpg |director = Renny Harlin |writer = Alexi Hawley,
William Wisher Jr.,
Caleb Carr |starring = Stellan Skarsgård,
Izabella Scorupco,
James D'Arcy,
Ralph Brown |producer = Aaron Dem,
Guy McElwaine,
David C. Robinson |distributor= Warner Bros |budget = $80,000,000 |released= August 20 2004 |runtime = 116 minutes |language = English |imdb_id = 0204313 |}}

Exorcist: The Beginning produced by Morgan Creek Productions is a 2004 prequel to the 1973 film The Exorcist. It was adapted by William Wisher Jr., Caleb Carr and Alexi Hawley, and directed by Renny Harlin. The movie stars Stellan Skarsgård, Izabella Scorupco, James D'Arcy, Ben Cross, Ralph Brown and Alan Ford.

The plot revolves around the crisis of faith suffered by Father Merrin (Skarsgård) following the horrific events he witnessed during World War II. Now an archeologist in Cairo, Merrin is inticed to the dig of a Byzantine church in East Africa, where he initially encounters the demon which he will encounter again in The Exorcist.

The making of the movie was itself full of drama. John Frankenheimer was initially set to direct, but stepped down just before his death. He was replaced by Paul Schrader, but the producers were completely unsatisfied with the film he presented them, and they fired him and replaced him with Harlin, who went back and re-filmed most of the movie, adding new characters and deleting others. The character of Father Francis, originally played by Gabriel Mann, had to be recast with D'Arcy because Mann had a scheduling conflict. In 2005, the Schrader version was released to theaters as Dominion: Prequel to the Exorcist.

Tagline: A new chapter of evil.

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Trivia

John Frankenheimer (director of the original "Manchurian Candidate") voluntarily stepped down from directing the movie one month before his death.
After director John Frankenheimer abandoned the project, it was rumored that Morgan Creek producers would hire David Rocksavage to go on with the movie. These rumors were proved wrong when Paul Schrader was hired.
Morgan Creek Productions fired Paul Schrader after he had submitted a completed movie, saying that he had given them "footage without any of the bloody violence the backers had wanted". He had already made it clear in interviews that he was making more of a psychological drama than an all-out gore-fest. He was fired and Renny Harlin was hired to re-shoot the movie. Almost 90% of the movie was re-shot and at least two characters have been dropped from Paul Schrader's version of the movie. Following the lackluster reception to Harlin's version, though, Schrader's version was finally released as Dominion: Prequel to the Exorcist (2005).
Several changes followed the firing of Paul Schrader, both in crew and cast. Screenwriter Alexi Hawley was called to retool the previous script, and he cut off some characters of Paul Schrader's version, besides adding some new ones, like the one played by actress Izabella Scorupco. Actor Gabriel Mann, who played Father Francis in the original version, was not able to re-shoot his scenes due to schedule problems, so new director Renny Harlin replaced him with James D'Arcy.

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