But if I were a civilian and Schrader's version was miraculously opening on the same day as Harlin's, I'd make an effort to see both. I'd feel obliged to consider the whole saga.

What saga? Oh, right, yeah...

Boiled down, notoriously willful and hot-headed Morgan Creek honcho James Robinson hired Schrader to direct EXORCIST: THE BEGINNING, based on a script by Caleb Carr. It was basically a prequel to the Freidkin film, about Max von Sydow's Father Merrin on a moral guilt trip as he confronts a demon in East Africa in the late 1940s.

Schrader put his usual arty-thoughtful spin on it and avoided any pea-soup spewings. Robinson saw his cut in mid '03, didn't find it scary enough, re-cut it, still didn't like it, canned Schrader and had his movie shelved. He brought in Harlin, had a fresh script written (by Alexi Hawley), and sent Harlin off to Rome to shoot a whole new film.

Schrader's version cost $35 million; Harlin's cost $50 million-plus. In any event, Morgan Creek is said to have decided to issue both versions on DVD (possibly as some kind of double-disc DVD package) sometime in early '05.

The only good thing I can detect for sure about the Harlin is that Izabella Scarupco is in it. Pleasing, I mean. I've seen her picture.

Stellan Skarsgard, who plays the young Merrin, is in both versions. (It should be fun to compare his performances when the two discs comes out.) Liam Neeson was cast as Merrin before, but fell out for some reason. Nobody cares.

An L.A. journalist who's read the script for the Harlin film says "there's no question that it's a more conventional horror piece than what Schrader and Caleb Carr envisioned.

"Of course, that doesn't mean it will be bad, but it does help to back up Schrader's oft-stated claim that the problems Morgan Creek had with his version of the film were, at least to some extent, endemic to the script. Because clearly, if they thought it was such a surefire commercial script, they wouldn't have rewritten it as extensively as they did for the Harlin version."

How does the Schrader version play? I tried three people who saw a rough version of it on tape last year -- former NEW YORK TIMES critic Janet Maslin, film critic and GUARDIAN essayist David Thomson, and Telluride Film Festival director Tom Luddy. I heard back from Thomson and Luddy by deadline.

Thomson told SUNDAY OBSERVER feature writer Mark Karmode that "what was clear was that the film was beautiful, mysterious, and full of anguish over lost faith. It seemed like the makings of a very valuable Schrader film." Thomson told me he found Schrader's film "interesting" and "pretty good," and that "it teases you in a Val Lewton-esque sort of way."

I'm a big fan of less-is-more thrills. I mentioned the holding-back element in M. Night Shyamalan's SIGNS when I spoke to Schrader during an AUTO FOCUS interview, in October '02. He told me he liked it also, and that he was trying to get the Morgan Creek team to understand that suggestion was scarier than in-your-face.

Does Schrader's EXORCIST have a decently rousing third act? "It's not that kind of film, [and] Schrader's not the right kind of director," said Thomson. "When I saw the film, I thought, well, Paul is being very clever and holding it back, and in the end there will be an extraordinary spectacle but...."

Luddy says the ending he saw is "far from finished in terms of effects and music and post-production...it was an armature of a finale that looked like it could be scary after it was finished.

"I like Stellan Skarsgaard, and from my take I liked [the film] a lot," Luddy adds. "It delivers in the last reels enough horror thrills that, I'd think, the producers would [be satisfied with]."

Merrins' character is "in a religious crisis that relates to Schrader's themes...he's a guy who's had to deal with a Sophie's Choice episode in his life that takes a heavy toll...the Nazi's telling him to either choose some people in a village to be killed, or else they'll go in and kill the whole village."

This in itself seems pretty far afield from the stuff of pulp horror.

"There had to be an understanding on Paul's point of view what a troubled route he was taking," says Thomson. "He must have known what problems he was in, and I guess he took a gamble that they would argue it and change it a bit, and then let it go. I assumed he had made a bargain with himself that he could do [this film] to please himself and Morgan Creek at the same time. I don't know why they hired him. It must have been clear in the script there were not great torrents of vomit."

Thomson told Karmode that the version he saw "didn't really seem like a continuation of the EXORCIST franchise, and to that extent one could foresee trouble. Schrader had made a film about spiritual isolation a study in a crisis of faith."

Schrader's lead actress, Clara Bellar, who was apparently hired by the previous director, John Frankeheimer, before he died, "is a drawback," says Thomson. "In my opinion she didn't do a very good job. It was a problem, but not such a problem that the film seemed unreleasable."

Last February Maslin told JOURNAL NEWS writer Marshall Fine, "I've heard of movies that went straight to video because they were low-end and cheesy, but that's not the case here. This film is beautifully shot...they'd be crazy just to pitch it.

"Paul takes the battle between good and evil very seriously," she added. "He makes dark, spiritually despairing films. Did [Morgan Creek execs] even read Paul's resume before they hired him?"

L.A. critic Scott Foundas has also seen Schrader's version. He expounds on it and the whole production mess in a piece that will be viewable late today (Wednesday, 8.11) at http://www.laweekly.com/ink/04/38/features-foundas.php. (If that doesn't work, go to www.laweekly.com and search around.)

Schrader's film is unfinished. It still has a temp score, and there's a good deal of effects work still in the crude stage. Foundas says Robinson told him it's all but a done deal that Morgan Creek will finish it and put it out on DVD, but Schrader says he hasn't been told this will happen in any sort of guaranteed way.

The really odd thing is that the IMDB, which is usually pretty thorough, doesn't even list EXORCIST: THE BEGINNING as one of Schrader's directing credits. The film itself isn't listed either.

Poor Ted

Screenwriter Ted Griffin got whacked last Thursday as director of a sequel he'd written to THE GRADUATE. I've met Ted and he's a good guy. This was his first directing gig, and you can bet he's feeling pretty destroyed right now. But the news that Rob Reiner is replacing him is just as bad, in a way.

Whatever this romantic comedy might have become under Griffin, it will now, under Reiner, most likely become a safer, squarer, more cushiony thing. What else could be expected from the director of NORTH, ALEX AND EMMA, THE STORY OF US and GHOSTS OF MISSISSIPPI? I guess that innovation or daring can sometimes be bad things, depending on the film.

The footage Griffin got (over a week's worth, I've read) has been scrapped, and it'll be back to square one when Reiner starts shooting at the end of this week, or early next.

Jennifer Aniston, who plays the lead role, allegedly did most of the complaining and lobbying to have Griffin removed. Apparently the dailies weren't funny enough, or something. Griffin apparently spent too much time on shots with dp Ed Lachman (FAR FROM HEAVEN), and not enough time taking care of Aniston. She was said to be unhappy with how she was being lighted, according to one report.

Why do first-time directors usually get the boot? Usually it's because they want to be Mike Nichols or Bernardo Bertolucci and wind up trying too hard to do too many hard things, and generally spreading themselves too thin and making everyone nuts.

Griffin (MATCHSTICK MEN, OCEAN'S ELEVEN) wrote the script for the still-untitled Warner Bros. production, which is about a young woman (Aniston) who discovers that her grandmother (Shirley MacLaine) was the basis for the Ms. Robinson character in the 1967 film THE GRADUATE. (I'm sorry but that sounds like a perfectly dreadful set-up.) Kevin Costner, Mark Ruffalo and Mena Suvari are co-starring.

I HEART HUCKABEES dp Peter Deming will apparently replace Lachman.

Change of Plan

I'm being told that the hyphen in the URL for the new Hollywood Elsewhere site (which may be active as soon as next Wednesday, the 18th) will be a problem for some. People don't like hyphens, don't like typing them between words, etc. So please, to prevent any problems along these lines, if you're into this column and intend to follow me to my solo site, bookmark the URL here and now: www.hollywood-elsewhere.com.

Here's what the top-of-the-column logo art will look like, by the way. I'm not planning any radical design changes on top of this. Same old format (for the most part), same old archive links. The only new thing is a new cover page. Everyone should go to the new page now and bookmark it. I know about laziness (particularly my own) and I'd like to avoid any problems.

Another change is that I may not leave Movie Poop Shoot as of September 1st. The new site will be active as of next Wednesday, but I might hang around a few extra weeks so readers can have more time to get used to the new URL. The idea is that the column will run concurrently on both sites, and I'll keep prompting everyone to bookmark the new place.

Let's play a game. Go the new web page, check out the photo, and write in and identify, if you can, the name of the restaurant. (It's not in Los Angeles.) I'll give it two weeks. The person who comes closest to naming it, or at least comes the closest to naming the city or the neighborhood it's in, wins. And the prize could be...I don't know, an invite to an all-media screening and a modest dinner to follow? If you live in L.A., that is, or if you're visiting.

Brilliant

You may have started to believe that George Bush's presidency was toast after seeing FAHRENHEIT 9/11. But those new Errol Morris "Real People" ads that just went up on www.moveonpac.org are the clinchers. Actually, they're lethal.

There are 17 of them, all featuring Republicans or independents who voted for Bush in 2000 explaining why he's not getting their vote next November. It's just one average- American type after another -- grade school teachers, a building contractor, a financial advisor, a former U.S. ambassador, a small-business owner -- letting it all out, straight and to the point.

If you watch them all and really consider their words and how many others like them probably feel the same, it gradually sinks in that Bush just isn't going to make it. Not with this crew against him. They seem fairly measured, cautious...their thoughts are lucid and organized and dug in.

I suppose the Republicans could have found their own Errol Morris in '96 and produced a series of anti-Clinton ads that played just as damning....but I don't think so. Something extra is going on here. These people appear genuinely disillusioned and turned off. They don't seem to be venting. They seem touched by finality and regret.

A 5th grade teacher named Anthony Pirro says, "In the beginning I thought George Bush was a pretty likable character...he was very personable and he had a sense of humor and I thought...you know what?...he seems pretty down to earth. So I voted for him. Looking back on it, I thoroughly regret it. Fact is, I'm appalled that I voted for him. I'm embarrassed. He doesn't think things through. We had full support in 2001 from the world community. And now our country is...a mess."

A financial advisor named Kim Mecklenburg says, "I've been a lifelong Republican since I was old enough to vote, and I thought Bush would be a fiscally conservative individual. I feel betrayed. I don't believe that a government should be engaged in reckless spending. Recklessly stretching the military to the point of breaking. Recklessly trying to stretch, alter and amend the Constitution that this country is based on. And that's why I'm gonna vote for John Kerry."

A 6th grade teacher named Debbie Mancuso says, "One of the things I've learned being a teacher is that part of the reason I get respect from my students is being respectful to them, and President Bush hasn't earned mine, because there is not truth in his message. Weapons of mass destruction don't exist in Iraq, and that is why we went to Iraq. You can call it, you know, little white lies or shading the truth...but it's a lie. He doesn't respect us."

Anyone who watches these ads is being asked to vote on which are the most effective. The winners (I don't know how many) will run as paid TV ads during the Republican National Convention.

I called Morris's office in Cambridge to get some production details, but he was in France shooting a commercial. He once told me he was an "anyone but Bush" type of guy, and I'm betting he did these spots for cost. His assistant Tricia said 41 spots had been filmed altogether and that others might turn up on moveonpac.org before long.

I haven't mentioned that Morris is a renowned and respected documentary filmmaker, and that he won the Best Feature Documentary Oscar last February for THE FOG OF WAR. I was assuming everyone knew this. One should always guard against assumptions.

Watch these spots and tell me if I'm over-estimating. If you disagree, please explain why. I think if enough swing voters see these ads, the election is really, really over. The ads are at www.moveonpac.org/morris/

Dumbo Dishes

Most of the complaints about sound in movie theatres, I'm guessing, are that the levels are too high. I have the opposite beef when I pay to see a film. I'm used to bright, full- on sound levels at critics screenings, so when I see a film with regular folks it often feels like the sound is too weak. Now and then I find myself leaning forward and cupping my ears to hear stuff better. Not frequently, but sometimes.

My idea is to sell wire-and-plastic dumbo ears to movie-theatre patrons. They'd slip on your head like earphones and fit behind your ears. They'd essentially be a pair of huge half-shells that would work like a satellite dish, catching all those exciting extra sound waves. I'm just thinking out loud, but theatres could sell cheap cardboard versions, or patrons could buy quality-level "dumbos" made of comfortable, wire-enforced padded leather with foam rubber inside.

Has anyone out there ever heard of this idea? Even as a drawing-board thing? Well, I claim it. It's mine, dammit.

Against the Tide

"I haven't seen OPEN WATER but I've heard from some fellow scuba divers who have. And one thing that makes them happy is its adherence for the most part to reality.

"I'm referring to your review when you said, 'Travis's character says at one point that there's no point in trying to swim anywhere due to currents and whatnot... At one point they spot a buoy floating two or three hundred yards away, and they swim for it...but not hard or long enough. I wouldn't care how many life forms are underneath or how hungry they might be, or how strong the currents are. I would reach that sucker.'

"I hear you, hoss, but hold on. One of the first important things you learn as a scuba diver is to not even try swmming against a mild current. It's a sure-fire way to exhaust yourself. No matter what your will or intention, against major ocean currents it is literally physically impossible. Even a mild one will exhuast you straight away. When diving in open water from a boat in a site that has a very mild current, you start the dive against and swim back to the boat with the current if necessary, because after a dive you're already physically exhausted, impaired by the loss of body heat times greater than normal, and your physiology is dealing with the pressure change.

"The rules taught by the largest recreational diving certifier in the world, PADI, clearly states to recreational divers not to even try. In the case of currents interfering with your return to the boat you dove from, you are taught to stay put and wait in place for the boat to return to the same position to retrieve you. Which in the real incident didn't happen, and only a few weeks ago off of L.A. at Catalina Island the same thing occurred (due to yet again a bad head count by the onboard divemaster). Luckily, the diver at Catalina Island was sighted and rescued eight very long hours later. **

"My reaction to that scene would've been a sharp recognition that the people involved in the filmmaking know what they're talking about. Although hard to visualize dramatically, watching that I would've completely understood what the character meant and felt it physically. It might've even resonated more knowing as I do that it just can't be done but goddamit you sure would like to try." Aaron Stewsrt

** Wells to readers: I'm probably going to review this real-life story in Friday's column. This happened in April, which of course was three months after the OPEN WATER current started reverberating at Sundance. Understandably, the scuba-diving industry began to be concerned about the fears that the film would probably put into the minds of would-be customers. You'd think everyone in the business would have gotten extra strict about head counts, but no....some bozo screwed up again. Amazing.

Collateral

"It was really insightful to read your comments as a contrarian defense to an ending -- i.e., Jada Pinkett Smith suddenly re-appearing and factoring in again -- that is admittedly a point of contention for some people. I understand what you're saying, completely, about the emotional payoffs. When Max doesn't hesitate for a moment in his first shot on Vincent I was completely there and locked in -- but I think it's just a structural problem. Up to this point the film goes from luscious surreality and character beats to pure convention, and that's what's distracting. It's the most by-the-numbers scene I've ever seen in a Michael Mann film.

"I might've been happy watching two hours of L.A. out those glass windows since this is literally the first movie I've ever seen where night really looks like night, due to the camera being used (a cinematographer buddy called me yesterday raving ecstatically about the camerawork, and this guy knows his stuff, having been raised by an ASC member, and he went into the film cold sitting there trying to figure out for the life of him what film stock the damn picture was shot on until finally he realized that it was digital).

"But it's still at its heart the most conventional thing going in the movie from a dramatic standpoint. I can buy the whole coincidence as they set it up nicely. What I can't buy is the lack of invention in the script from the moment of the cab crash onward. One cliche pops up after another, piling up, whereas beforehand the film was offering a nice even mix of Mann's personal obsessions with the rote mechanics of a thriller we expect. Vincent turning into Robert Patrick from T2 and Max dealing with the cell phone losing its battery at a vital moment -- you could hear the packed house I saw this with actually starting to disconnect, with a lot of groaning and giggling.

The real triumph here is that up until this point Mann has actually seduced an audience into his aesthetic in a populist way, so much so they get lost when he starts going back to what they know. I agree with you -- the final moments absolutely work and are right for the characters, and if you go with the flow you just feel it -- but you have to keep pinching yourself when the conventional takes over and for the first time the movie makes you aware: you are watching a movie.

"All that aside COLLATERAL deserves a place in history for being the first studio film to justify shooting on digital. Not for any crazy George Lucas reasons (if anyone can ever explain to me why he insisted on adding a third rear speaker to create Dolby Digital EX...), but because it actually allows you to do something never done before, show you something that previously was technically impossible. COLLATERAL will set a standard perhaps as the DAYS OF HEAVEN of movies shot at night. As I left the theatre I heard a lot of 'but the camerawork and mood were fantastic,' and this from a suburban, non industry audience, which is something I've NEVER heard before.

"And yet strangely I'm betting that no one will rise to Mann's challenge or imprint for a long time to come. Me and my friend I saw it with agreed -- we would've been happy watching Pinkett Smith (finally getting a chance to show her chops again in a few small really choice moments -- I love it when she gives Max the card -- that one actorly beat managed to dispel my notions of the class divide that would be a barrier to these two) and Foxx driving around talking in that cab all night as long as it continued to look and sound that pretty.

"There's some serious stuff going on there in the interplay between your visual cortex and what's on-screen, something about the psychology of recognizing and feeling exactly what it means to be up at that hour and the type of conversations you can end up having that rings absolutely true. It's funny because just the other night I was driving through L.A. on the 405 at 4am and drinking in the night sky burnt red from all the sodium lights, the buildings whizzing by reflecting all the lights below, and at one remove you notice how ugly it is, but shown as a mood in that film you recognize the sheer beauty of it. " -- Aaron Stewart

Wells to Stewart: A beautifully written letter, Aaron. Thanks.

"You wrote that the coincidence at the end of COLLATERAL (the reintroduction of Pinkett Smith's character) is a stretch. And it is, sort of, but maybe not as much as you're suggesting.

"Remember that Vincent passes her on the elevator just as he comes out of the MTA at the beginning of the film, and we get a look at his impassive face as he sees her -- and also remember that Max, due to his perfect knowledge of LA's streets, has gotten Pinkett Smith to her destination a bit earlier than expected.

"It would seem that Vincent intended Pinkett Smith to be hit #1, but missed her because Max screwed up his timing by getting her to the office earlier than Vincent planned for. That logical explanation (which I believe was spelled out in the original screenplay) goes a long way toward making the film's third act seem less of a coincidence." -- NJA.