I've only seen a handful of Italian Exorcist rip-offs but I've seen enough to know that this type of film generally isn't very high quality. The same can't be said for Alberto De Martino's The Antichrist, however, which is so far in front of all the other Exorcist rip-offs that I've seen that you could just about throw all the rest of the Italian devil/demons films into the mix and this one would still rise above the majority of them.
This was probably the most blatant of the Exorcist rip-offs. It's certainly the funniest.
More exorcist style rip offs from Alberto De Martino, director of hilarious Kirk-Douglas-In-The-Buff Omen rip off "Holocaust 2000" and so-so haunted house film "The Blancheville Monster". This time, he's in Rome detailing the demonic possession of a paralysed woman who falls prey to a past life where she was a witch.
The beauty of Morricone is that for every big budget or quality film that he did music for - The Hateful Eight, Days of Heaven, Once Upon a Time In America - you can find scores he did for movies that aren't as well thought of, from giallo like What Have You Done to Solange? and A Lizard in a Woman's Skin to outright ridiculous films like Butterfly and, well, this movie.
As far as "Exorcist" rip offs go, "L'Anticristo" isn't as bad as "Beyond the Door", which is small praise indeed. It benefits in numerous scenes from the cinematography of one Aristede Massaccessi - otherwise known as trash purveyor Joe D'amato.
This Exorcist rip off isn't so rip off. A big part of the plot is original and the special visual effects are great.
A bitter and sexually frustrated crippled young woman (superbly played with absolutely fearless abandon by Carla Gravina) renounces her faith in God. Since said lovely young lady was in a previous life a witch who got burned at the stake as a heretic 400 years ago, this makes it doubly easy for Satan to take possession of her body.
A friend of mine lent me this video under the pretense that it was "more full on than the Exorcist". What a load of arse!!
When I went in the video store to look for a horror video I found this piece of flop that unfortunately blew me away with the words "the best special effects" and I decided to give it a try. Boy was I wrong!
