Exorcist: The Beginning

Laughable horror prequel set decades before the events of The Exorcist, in which a young Father Merrin joins an archaeological dig to unearth a fifth-century church buried beneath the plains of Kenya. As the excavation goes on, strange occurrences plague the camp - culminating in madness and bloodshed as an ancient evil is unleashed upon the world. The making of this horrendous film was infamous, with original director Paul Schrader being booted off the movie in favour of a less cerebral, more bloodsoaked effort from Renny Harlin. The end result is a joke of a movie, while Schrader's original cut, later released on DVD, proved much more effective. Stellan Skarsgard, Izabella Scorupco and James D'Arcy star