Review: The Exorcism of Molly Hartley

20ish Molly Hartley (Sarah Lind) gets wild and crazy at the club on her birthday, has some ‘e’, and takes two people home with her for a threesome. The next morning she wakes up and sees her two overnight guests have been brutally murdered and the cops are banging on her door. She’s also hearing demonic voices. Needless to say, the cops have her hauled off to an insane asylum where her shrink (Gina Holden) believes she has a psychosomatic disorder of some kind and looks into the girl’s family history of mental illness for answers. A fallen priest (Devon Sawa) who is currently an inmate of the hospital, however, sees it as something very different. Molly is possessed by a demon, something Sawa knows a little bit about. You see, he had performed an exorcism on a heavily pregnant woman before, and given his current place of residence, it clearly didn’t end up well. Can Sawa summon up the nerve to battle both his nerves and the demon inside Molly to save her soul?

I missed “The Haunting of Molly Hartley”, but confusion is not among this 2015 follow-up’s problems. It’s perfectly coherent from start to finish, no matter if you’ve seen the earlier film or not. It’s just not much of a movie, is all. The problem is that, like every other exorcism film since “The Exorcist”, director Steven Monroe (the appallingly empty “House of 9” and the remake of “I Spit on Your Grave”) and sequel-obsessed screenwriter Matt Venne (“Fright Night 2”, “Mirrors 2”, “White Noise: The Light”) don’t give us much from outside the usual formula. Sure, it’s nice to see a non-‘found footage’ horror film for a change, but even the makeup (whilst rather decent) is very Linda Blair. It’s the same old exorcism movie stuff, and I’m not a fan of exorcism films to begin with.

This is yet another one that basically shoots itself in the foot by openly touting that ‘the church’ no longer trains priests to perform exorcisms. You’re basically saying that it’s bullshit. If demonic possession were real, you can be damn sure priests would still be trained to perform exorcisms. I’m an Agnostic Atheist, but geez, it’d at least help me buy into the bullshit for 90 minutes or so if they’d keep quiet on that. Also, you can tell a Catholic made this, because the title character becomes possessed through really dorky hedonism: A few lesbian kisses, some party drugs, and a threesome that fades to black before it actually gets started (Seriously? Fuck you, movie!). The next morning it’s all murder-y and voicebox-y demonic possession. Right.

An unrecognisable Devon Sawa isn’t bad, Sarah Lind is absolutely hot as hell, and the early visage of a possessed, heavily pregnant woman is pretty startling stuff. She’s going into labour, and the demon still has a hold on her. Wow. After that, though, it’s all Linda Blair makeup and voicebox demon-talking nonsense, though it was cute that the main priest was already in the mental institution when Molly arrives. I also really liked the music score, which was a combo of ‘Tubular Bells’, “Halloween”, and “A Nightmare on Elm Street”.

I’m just sick of this subgenre, I’ve always been much more of a fan of “The Omen” than “The Exorcist” anyway, but if at all possible, this subgenre needs to find a way to move away from “The Exorcist” (Hardly likely given we now have a TV version of “The Exorcist” with Geena Davis, as I write this). This one doesn’t manage that escape. Sure, Molly’s family history with mental illness is fascinating stuff, but given the film’s title, it’s completely irrelevant. It does, however lead to one of the dumbest moments I’ve seen in a movie in quite some time, though: Molly projectile vomits on her shrink, and the shrink still thinks (and I quote) it’s all just ‘a psychosomatic self-fulfilling prophecy’. Fuck off, you overpaid quack. She’s possessed by a frigging demon. Watch a freaking movie some time, OK? Although it stops dead with about 10 minutes to go, the film’s brevity is its chief virtue. What does that tell you?

Another mediocre, clichéd exorcism film that yet again just serves to prove that “The Exorcist” (love it or not) said everything that there was to say about this subgenre of horror. Let’s quit while we’re behind, OK? I’m beyond sick of these films. Exorcism movie fans might want to bump the rating up a bit, but I was mostly bored by this.

Rating: C