Moviegoers in 1973 being interviewed after watching The Exorcist for the first time. Directed by William Friedkin, the film became an unprecedented cultural phenomenon, causing massive lines around the block and documented physical hysteria among viewers.
When the film first rolled out in late December 1973, it shocked audiences like no horror movie before it. The graphic imagery, intense audio design, and disturbing themes caused moviegoers to shudder, cry, vomit, and faint right in the theaters.
The physical distress was so frequent that theater managers had to actively prepare for medical incidents. Staff were routinely equipped with sick bags and smelling salts (in both small bottles and breakable pellets) to revive fainted patrons in the lobby. As a theater manager notes in the archival broadcast, it was historically very rare for a film to trigger such visceral, unconscious physical reactions.
In the clip, the individuals explain exactly what pushed them over the edge. One viewer details passing out during the gruesome, clinical spinal tap scene. Another fainted the moment the young girl (played by Linda Blair) shifted her voice and began speaking in the “devil’s voice.”
The hysteria was so intense that one audience member who fainted and broke his jaw inside a theater actually sued Warner Bros., claiming that the film’s intense subliminal imagery caused the incident. The lawsuit was ultimately settled out of court.
Despite the disgust, many fainted audience members interviewed in the footage admitted that their curiosity was killing them, stating that they intended to go right back into the theater to try and finish the movie.
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