The Most Controversial Religious Movies of All Time

The Exorcist

Anyone who's seen this 1973 horror classic will probably tell you there's nothing creepier than a little girl possessed by the devil. Especially one who spews curses--and vomit--on men of the cloth and whose head can rotate 360 degrees. The special effects are graphic and frightening, particularly the wounds young Regan MacNeil, played by Linda Blair, inflicts upon herself, and the scene in which when she forcefully violates herself with a crucifix. When the film was released in theaters, many people couldn't tolerate the violence and blasphemies, and there was an outcry over the general scariness of the film. Some clergy, like the Rev. Billy Graham, felt the movie itself was satanic.


--Dena Ross