MY BEST FRIEND'S EXORCISM (2022)

Studio:     Amazon Studios
Director:    Damon Thomas
Writer:     Jenna Lamia
Producer:  Ellen Goldsmith-Vein, David Borgenicht, Christopher Landon, Jennifer Semler
Stars:     Elsie Fisher, Amiah Miller, Rachel Ogechi Kanu, Cathy Ang, Clayton Royal Johnson, Nathan Anderson, Cynthia Evans, Christopher Lowell

Review Score:

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Summary:

High school gets even more complicated for a teenage girl whose best friend becomes possessed by a demonic entity.

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Synopsis:     Show/Hide Spoilers

Teenage best friends Abby Rivers and Gretchen Lang join their classmates Margaret Chisholm and Glee Tanaka at Margaret’s lake house, which is located near an abandoned building where a girl was rumored to have been sacrificed in a satanic ritual, for a sleepover. The four friends inadvertently summon an evil spirit while playing with a Ouija board. Margaret’s boyfriend Wallace Stoney then joins the group and everyone drops LSD together.

While tripping on the acid, Abby and Gretchen explore the haunted building nearby. Following several scary experiences, a paranormal presence attacks Gretchen.

Christian, Micah, and Jonah Lemon, who perform as fitness instructors and motivational speakers under the name The Lemon Brothers, put on a show at Aberdale Academy, the Catholic high school attended by Abby and her friends. As Gretchen begins acting oddly, Abby notices Christian Lemon staring concernedly at Gretchen. Abby wonders if the LSD is continuing to adversely affect Gretchen as her behavior continues growing worrisome, including projectile vomiting on Wallace and urinating in front of other students in a classroom.

Gretchen confesses to Abby that she was attacked at the lake house and a presence continues to haunt her. Abby interprets Gretchen’s revelation as a sexual assault. Abby speaks to Gretchen’s parents as well as Sister Kathleen and Brother Morgan at school, but her concern for Gretchen is threateningly dismissed. Abby returns to the haunted house for clues and finds the name “Andras” scrawled on a wall.

Abby alienates Margaret as well as Glee by suggesting Wallace may have raped Gretchen. Wallace punches Abby in her stomach over the allegation. Gretchen expresses resentment toward Abby for breaking her promise to not tell anyone what happened.

At a school carnival, Gretchen publicly humiliates Abby by submerging her in a dunking booth and revealing Abby’s crush on Brother Morgan. Abby tearfully terminates their friendship.

Fully succumbing to her possession, Gretchen suddenly becomes more popular, charismatic, and manipulative at school. Gretchen exploits Margaret’s body image issues by poisoning her with diet shakes. In addition to flirting with Wallace, Gretchen also embarrasses Glee by exposing her unrequited crush on Margaret. Gretchen then feeds Glee a brownie with peanuts to induce a severe allergic reaction.

Despite expressing concern for everyone’s wellbeing, her former friends continue to shun Abby. Still hopeful about helping Gretchen, Abby steals her Trapper Keeper to look for more clues on her condition. In addition to drawings of violent imagery, Abby finds the name “Andras” among Gretchen’s frightening notes.

Abby visits Margaret, who is now bedridden from emaciation, at her home. Abby discovers Gretchen poisoned Margaret. Long, parasitic worms suddenly emerge from Margaret’s mouth.

Abby also visits Glee while she recovers from Gretchen’s scheme. After learning what happened to Margaret, Glee implores Abby to stop Gretchen from hurting anyone else.

Remembering the look he previously gave Gretchen, Abby consults Christian Lemon for help. Christian confirms that Gretchen is demonically possessed and recommends that he perform his first solo exorcism on her.

Abby sneaks into Gretchen’s house, drugs her drink, and then takes her to the lake house with Christian. Christian begins to exorcise the demon Andras, but Christian abruptly leaves when the demon takes on the appearance of his mother.

Abby stabs Gretchen in her stomach with a fireplace poker after she takes on her full demon form. Abby continues a makeshift exorcism ritual that results in Andras eventually emerging from Gretchen’s body. Abby burns the demon to death with fire.

Some time later, Gretchen moves two states away with her parents. However, Abby and Gretchen remain best friends and continue to take an annual trip back to the lake together.

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Review:

Nothing good ever happens when teenagers play with a Ouija board in a horror movie, even in one wearing a humorous halo like “My Best Friend’s Exorcism.” Couple an impromptu spirit summoning session with dropping LSD and you’re guaranteed to have a gruesome ghoul hitching a ride on your acid trip.

That’s what happens to inseparable best friends Abby and Gretchen when they join Catholic school classmates Margaret and Glee for a sleepover. We’re told from the ”Take on Me” needle drop and bedroom wall plastered with Culture Club posters that this is the 1980s, which means the Satanic Panic has hit its peak. Margaret’s lake house happens to be situated near an old building where a local girl was supposedly sacrificed, and Abby and Gretchen can’t resist the forbidden fruit of spelunking around a haunted location. The duo gets more than hallucinogenic freak-outs though, as Gretchen gets attacked by a paranormal presence.

Based on author Grady Hendrix’s same-named novel, “My Best Friend’s Exorcism’s” greatest creative strength comes from using demonic possession to make “Mean Girls” metaphors out of the social horrors of high school. If not for the evil entity inside of her, Gretchen’s sudden switch from spunky 16-year-old into a scheming sophomore might be waved off as an ordinary evolution often seen when teens undergoing personality transformations outgrow former friends or end up seduced by the sadism of inflicting emotional pain on peers. Gretchen steals more than a few pages out of Regan MacNeil’s playbook when she projectile vomits on Margaret’s jock boyfriend and spontaneously urinates all over a classroom floor. She takes even more cues from Lindsay Lohan, making manipulative moves that exploit her clique’s issues with eating disorders, sexual identity, and embarrassing secrets using very public displays of devastating humiliation.

Hoping to help her friend, Abby encounters roadblocks in the form of authoritative adults, another standard stereotype when suburban melodrama comes into play. Distracted parents just don’t understand what their daughters are going through. School administrators are equally useless, even turning the tables to level threats against Abby when she tries responsibly reporting her concerns about Gretchen. Misinterpreting Gretchen’s possession as a possible byproduct of sexual assault, Abby also alienates her friends by making a reckless rape allegation in one of the movie’s more misguided moments. That’s the thing with “My Best Friend’s Exorcism.” The sincerity of its sentimentality means well, but a breezy 90-minute lark streaming on Amazon doesn’t provide a properly tuned piano for hitting all of the intended notes of horror, humor, and heart.

“My Best Friend’s Exorcism” offers a textbook example of a film that’s functionally “fine,” nothing more, nothing less. Elsie Fisher and Amiah Miller play Abby and Gretchen as generally likable enough. It’s just that their introductions feel like a Cliff’s Notes version of a first act that never truly establishes an unbreakable bond that should anchor everything important about their story. Ironically illustrated by an opening scene where the two of them gossip over the phone instead of in person, we only get to know the girls in an impersonal manner rather than sharing meaningful experiences with them.

Supporting roles get bit by the curse of cardboard characterizations, too. It’s repeatedly obvious that the script stripped down its source material to a bare minimum of beats as people like Gretchen’s father and Christopher Lowell’s buffoonish motivational speaker are either defined by one oddball detail or else hit dead ends on abandoned side stories.

Although categorized as a light comedy, “My Best Friend’s Exorcism” is far from a laugh riot. Dialogue features no memorable one-liners or standout jokes. As has already been said, that’s the thing about the movie. Neither a mold-breaker nor a risk-taker, “My Best Friend’s Exorcism” finds contentment in doing it by the book, no pun intended since it’s an adaptation, and comfortably riding a middle road into mediocrity. It’s not insultingly average. It’s not annoyingly underwhelming, either. It’s merely a movie that more or less just “is.”

Review Score: 55

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