1. The Exorcist (1973)
I think the point is to make us despair. To see ourselves as animal and ugly. To make us reject the possibility that God could love us. It isnt the structured perfectly; in fact, many of the scenes feel like they jump too quickly into the next one. The plot seems to advance far too fast in the beginning. The ending resolves the story, but not in the way we want or hope for. And yet, it does what all good horror films should: it forces us, in our humanity, to confront true darkness. To see if we can reconcile evils existence. To see if we can overcome it. The Exorcist pits three main characters against the demon that has taken up residence in young Regan MacNeil (Linda Blair). The first is her mother, an actress, Chris (Ellen Burstyn), a nonbeliever who turns first to scientists and doctors to try to cure her little girl. Then there is Father Merrin (Max von Sydow), a dutiful believer who knows his responsibilities to the church and to his God, and fights against the demon without worry for his personal well being even though he knows the exorcism may well kill him due to his poor health. In between the two of them is Father Karras (Jason Miller), a Jesuit psychiatrist whose faith is breaking following the death of his mother. He assists Chris first as a doctor, but slowly finds Regans case to be a true battle with his shaking faith, whether he wants to admit it or not. Were likely to find ourselves in one of these three characters. We may be believers in something outside of this world, we may not be. We may be like Karras, unsure of where we stand, wanting to believe in something yet finding ourselves unable to. The Exorcist is a great horror film because it shows us how we, no matter who we are, confront an ultimate form of evil. Regardless of what we believe, it must be challenged, must be fought, no matter the cost to us.
I said in the opening to this article that the horror that affects us most is almost always tied to our own personal fears and experiences. I cannot deny the fact that my personal belief in The Exorcist as the most essential, and potentially most frightening horror film of all time is rooted, or at least influenced, by the fact that I had a very religious, specifically Catholic, upbringing. I dont know if this film, or any of the films on this list, would affect me differently if my personal experiences and life outside of the movies was any different than the one that Ive had. How can anyone know such things? Yet, this is the film that, to me, embodies the idea of horror the best, that holds up over and over again over repeated views. The film that never seems to shrink in its horror, that even today can feel shocking and frightening despite how many years have past, despite how many other things horror films have showed us since. Horror is the genre where we most directly come in contact the idea of evil, where we see that it exists in the world around us, that it oftentimes strikes without warning or reason, and that sometimes cannot be defeated. All of the films on this list, even the ones that are enjoyable and fun, force an interaction with these ideas. They pit us against our deepest, darkest fears from the safety of a theater or living room, and even if they dont allow us to conquer or resolve those fears, the confrontation itself is still important in that it at least forces us to think about these things, to perhaps rearrange our concepts of evil and fear. The Exorcist, more than any other horror film, forces this confrontation. It asks us to stare unblinkingly at an unthinkable, uncompromising evil, and try to deal with it. Because of that, it is the most essential of all horror films. Again, different films affect and frighten different people in different ways, and the rankings on this list are, of course, completely arbitrary. Feel free to comment with your favorite horror films, along with the films that I either forgot or left off this list.