SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE, BUILDING AND DESIGN

THE DESIGN SCHOOL

FOUNDATION IN NATURAL BUILD ENVIRONMENT

NAME: Loh Pey Mun

STUDENT ID NO: 0318572

FILMS SELECTED: The Conjuring and The Exorcist

WORD COUNT: 820words

ENGLISH 2 (ELG 30605)

WRITTEN ASSIGNMENT 1: COMPARE – CONTRAST ESSAY

LECTURER: CASSANDRA WIJESURIA

SUBMISSION DATE: 5TH DECEMBER 2014

Horror movie is a film genre that seeks to elicit a negative emotional reaction from audience by playing

on the viewer's primal fears.

Horror movies are my favorite, because they are the only type of movie that I can’t keep my eyes off

from the beginning until the end. I often have nightmares after watching horror movies and sometimes

it caused me to have trouble going to sleep at night. The two movies that I am going to compare and

contrast are the movies which I like the most. The two movies are The Conjuring (2013) and The Exorcist

(1973). The Conjuring is directed by James Wan inspired by a true life story of the Perron family and The

Exorcist is directed by William Friedkin adapted by William Peter Blatty from his 1971 novel of the same

name. The essay will go into more details about the stories and their similarities. The three parallel

points of comparison of similarities are the genre, the storylines and the character between these two

movies.

To start off, both the main protagonists are possessed by a satanic demon as depicted in both of the

movies. These two movies have the similarities in which both the plot are about a certain character in

the movie who got possessed and inevitably summoned a pastor to perform an exorcism. The Conjuring

talks about The Warrens who came to help the Perron family, who were steeping in a satanic haunting

and targeted by demons in their farmhouses at Rhode Island in 1971. To stop this demon, they will have

to exorcise the demon. On the other hand, The Exorcist deals with the demonic possession of a twelve-

year-old little girl and her mother’s desperate attempts to bring her daughter back through an exorcism

conducted by two Fathers. In a word, The Conjuring and The Exorcist are of the same genre, which is

American supernatural horror movies.

Furthermore, the storylines of the two movies are the same. In “The Conjuring”, the Perron family

moved into a farm house and soon strange things started happening around them with escalating

nightmarish terror. For example, all of the clocks stopped at 3.07am every night, the dog was found

dead in the backyard, the photo frames along the wall fell down, clapping sounds at midnight and the

five daughters also faced different problems. The paranormal investigators, Ed and Lorraine Warren

examined the house and help them to collect evidences to convince the Church that it is necessary to

perform an exorcism to save the Perron family. In the “The Exorcist”, a little girl, Regan, was possessed

by a demon called Pazuzu. Many strange things also happened to the girl. Such as hurting herself using a

knife, the bed shaking continuously, strange sounds, the word “Help me” appearing on her stomach and

others. Her mother seeks the help from the Father, Karras. First, Karras refuses permission from the

Church to proceed an exorcism with another Father, Merrin. From the above, we can know that both

storylines are almost the same. Strange things that happened around them in the movie and they

needed help from the clergy. The Father, Ed and Lorraine Warren also needed to get permission from

Church to have an exorcism.

Besides that, the characters that I want to compare are the paranormal investigators in The Conjuring,

Ed and Lorraine with the two fathers in The Exorcist, Merrin and Karras. They are responsible as a clergy.

Although they know they will be in danger when performing an exorcism but they still tried their best to

save the victim. They also have their own way to solve the problem in the movie and their different

ending. In The Conjuring, Ed and Lorraine look like more responsible and professional. They did

research , for example, they found that the house belonged to a witch, Bathsheba. When Bathsheba's

husband caught her, killed her baby and offered it to Satan, she cursed all those who would use her land

will die and proclaimed her love for Satan before committing suicide. They also used camera and

physical phenomenon to conduct an initial investigation for asking permission to have an exorcism from

the Catholic Church. At last, they successfully saved the Perron family and also their own family. Nobody

died. But in The Exorcist, the two fathers use more traditional way to help the family. If they do a good

preparation liked the Ed and Lorraine, researched what is the aim of the demon and it history or others,

maybe the ending will be more prefect and they also would not die.

In conclusion, The Conjuring and The Exorcist are similar in the genre , storyline and character. Anyway, I

really enjoyed watching these two horror movies, especially The Conjuring. The storylines and the

shooting skill of both movies are very interesting and great. The ending for the both movies are also not

bad, at least the Perron family and Regan were saved. These two movies is two recommended films for

who like to watch horror movies. Enjoyed it.