Is The Exorcism based on a true story?

The Exorcism stars Russell Crowe as an actor dealing with his own demons, both metaphorical and potentially literal. So is the horror movie based on a true story?

Russell Crowe played The Pope’s Exorcist in 2023. Now in 2024, he’s starring in The Exorcism, a high-concept horror movie about scary goings-on during a movie shoot.

Crowe is Anthony Miller, an actor who starts to question his own sanity while making a supernatural horror movie. Which prompts his daughter to question if his past addictions have returned. Or if something more sinister is occurring.

So is The Exorcist based on a true story? Well it’s complicated and probably depends on your own personal beliefs. Minor SPOILERS ahead.

Is The Exorcism based on a true story?

While The Exorcism has its roots in reality — specifically the making of The Exorcist — the film isn’t based on true events.

Crowe’s character Anthony Miller is shooting a movie called The Georgetown Project in The Exorcism. It is very clearly a remake of The Exorcist, just with names and details changed.

During the shoot, accidents start happening on the film’s set, while Miller deteriorates both mentally and physically, and as proceedings progress, the actor appears to become possessed.

Is the movie set cursed? At one point a character references the fact that the original Exorcist suffered from that problem, making the connection to real life.

The curse of The Exorcist

There have been claims that something strange was indeed going down on the set of William Friedkin’s 1973 movie The Exorcist.

Stars Ellen Burstyn and Linda Blair both injured their backs while shooting the movie. Plus actors and members of the crew or those connected to them died during or soon after production ceased.

In 1974, Friedkin told horror magazine Castle of Frankenstein: “I’m not a convert to the occult, but after all I’ve seen on this film, I definitely believe in demonic possession… we were plagued by strange and sinister things from the beginning.”

But the author of the source material William Peter Blatty believed talk of a curse was nonsense. Speaking to the BFI Modern Classics book about The Exorcist, Blatty said any hoodoo was invented by Friedkin to help market the movie, adding: “If you shoot something for a year, people are going to get hurt, people are going to die.”

So, the truth of The Exorcism largely depends on whether you believe movie sets can really be cursed.

The Exorcism’s connection to The Exorcist

The Exorcism has another link with The Exorcist, through director and co-writer Joshua John Miller.

A child star who recently moved behind the camera, his father was Jason Miller, the actor who played Father Damien Karras in The Exorcist, and who passed away in 2001 at the age of 62.

He shares a last name with The Exorcism’s protagonist, while Jason Miller also had issues with alcohol, an addiction that nearly kills Anthony Miller before The Exorcism begins, and comes back to haunt him during the movie.

All of which adds another parallel to The Exorcist, and means in this respect, art is very much imitating life in The Exorcism.

With a Rotten Tomatoes score of 41% at present, The Exorcism probably won’t be making our list of 2024’s best movies. You can head here for more films hitting this month, and click here for the year’s box office winners.