The Faceless Horror: Unmasking the Entity in The Exorcist

The Exorcist is widely considered one of the scariest movies of all time, and much of its terror can be attributed to the mysterious entity that possesses young Regan. While Regan gets plenty of screen time, the true face of the entity is only glimpsed briefly, leaving audiences to speculate about its identity and motivations. According to the movie's mythology, the entity is Pazuzu, a demon king from Assyrian and Babylonian lore. However, Pazuzu's appearances in the film are so quick and subtle that many viewers miss them entirely. In fact, the image of Pazuzu's ghastly white face is only shown for a single frame, twice during the film. Director William Friedkin intended for this image to be subliminal, meaning that viewers are unnerved by it without even realizing what they saw. This technique was highly effective, as audiences were left with a sense of unease and terror that lingered long after the movie ended.

[Vaatacious]

This type of subtle imagery needs to return. No loud jump scares or mentions, just subliminal and unnerving

[WheezeTheJuice.]

Imagine the amount of nightmares people had just by seeing that face once. Insane directing.

[claytonangotti]

In my opinion, that one shot of the demons face is the most horrifying shot in any sort of cinema, im a grown ass adult and I still have a hard time with that one shot

[josebro]

Fun fact: the actress who played Pazuzu also played Richie Cunningham's date on an episode of Happy Days. 😊

[theculturedthug]

The Face scared the crap out of me for the good 10 years... I see the movie in the theatre in 1998 when I was 14 it was re-released for some anniversary or something.

[novaeblaid]

I remember seeing it for the first time and rewinding and keeping it on my screen for like 20 min

[williamjamesayers]

Pazuzu is actually shown 3 times, 1- in Regan's room when she is twitching, 2- when Damien is running to his mother in his dream, and 3- when Chris, Regan's mother, comes home and the lights are flickering in the kitchen and his image is shown in the background

[RichardRoeder-pe]

What a great movie this was I was 2 years old when this movie came out in 1973 I didn't see it until I was in elementary school ❤😂😢 I love you so much your 1 fan for life

[ToiletClogger]

the demon face is a hot 25 year old Eileen Dietz lol. crazy how amazing the make up is

[charliechurch]

Saw that movie once and THATS all!! That was enough for me!!

[ChampChamp]

I see it straight away it’s in the kitchen when she turns the light on

[dr.brianjudedelimaphd]

Its shown also near the end when Regan shows the most disturbing face and its a combination of Regan and captain howdy combined in 1 face

[TheBeautyGuyru]

The actress who played Pazuzu’s name is Elieen Dietz! She has a book about her experiences

[jaygasper]

The face was an original makeup test for Reagan as the demon but Friedkin thought it looked fake (good call) but when seeing a flash of it saw how scary it was and voilà. It's in a pretty recent documentary

[chrislieu]

That looks like Venger from the D&D cartoon.

[isaacgraham]

I think there’s a lot of truth as to why this one film is so effective. Stuff like this and the dream sequence and the opening Iraq sequence are what sets it apart from the dozens of sequels and imitations.

[ikarikid]

Twice? The Version You’ve Never Seen adds a few times

[jessesparks]

It's shown more if you watch the inferior version where Friedkin started dropping the face into scenes like a beginner learning how to Photoshop.

[davidshareefChTPhD]

This type of movie used subliminal suggestion and it got below your subconscious into your subconscious to scare you in a way most movies don't do today except for the Blair Witch Project and paranormal activity which by the way messed me up bad LOL😊

[cameronpeterson]

Its like in Over the Garden Wall when Wirt shines a flashlight over the Beast and for a millisecond it shows faces all over the Beast's body and his eyes are all white