Cinema Sentries reviewed David Kittredge’s Boorman and the Devil, a two-hour documentary that puts John Boorman’s Exorcist II: The Heretic back under the lens in 2024. The review argues that the film revives a notorious ’70s flop with enough context to show why Warner Bros. once gave Boorman serious money and room to work.
John Boorman and The Exorcist
John Boorman was not a huge fan of The Exorcist, even as he admired the technique. He considered its treatment of a child’s suffering sadistic and exploitative, then took Warner Bros.’ money and made Exorcist II: The Heretic as the sequel he thought should exist rather than the one audiences wanted.
That setup gives Boorman and the Devil its commercial logic. Kittredge’s film is not just a retrospective; it is a record of a studio era when big budgets could still be handed to directors and left largely alone. The review says the documentary uses interviews, archival footage, clips, and animation to reconstruct that gamble.
Louise Fletcher and Linda Blair
Louise Fletcher and Linda Blair appear in the documentary, and both recalled the production fondly and candidly. Several crew members also looked back with bemusement and pride, which gives the film more than the usual nostalgia pass; it turns the making of Exorcist II into a set of competing memories rather than a single failure story.
Nearly 50 years later, Boorman still calls Exorcist II: The Heretic some of his finest work. The review describes the result as a silly, occasionally spellbinding fairy tale, which is a sharper frame than the usual shorthand for a misfire. That split between reputation and self-regard is the hook: the film was dismissed as a notorious ’70s flop, yet the people closest to it still describe a serious artistic bet.
Boorman and the Devil in 2024
For viewers coming to the review now, the practical takeaway is simple: Boorman and the Devil is built around interviews and archival material, and it centers the people who made Exorcist II: The Heretic rather than treating the sequel as a punch line. The open question is the one the documentary leans into without fully settling — what specific scenes or production choices made audiences and critics reject the sequel so hard?
