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Repossessed: 'The Exorcist' Complete

Linda Blair's horror film now has additional footage

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The Exorcist

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They're billing it as ''The Version You've Never Seen'' — a fresh cut of 1973's The Exorcist with 11 minutes of unused footage. But there's one clip of stars Linda Blair and Ellen Burstyn that's still trapped in eternal damnation: ''We attempted to put back the scene where Ellen takes Linda all around Washington'' on her birthday, screenwriter William Peter Blatty tells EW. ''They go to the Lincoln Memorial — very light and airy. Then, at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, Linda turns hollow and sad — giving us the first hint of what's to come.'' But Blatty and director William Friedkin made a scary discovery in the editing room last year: ''We couldn't find the dialogue at the end of the scene,'' says Friedkin. ''It was lost.'' Burstyn and Blair can't even summon a memory of shooting it. ''We're talking 27 years ago,'' Burstyn says. Could it be ... Satan?

Originally posted Oct 06, 2000 Published in issue #562 Oct 06, 2000 Order article reprints

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