PLOT

15 years after the events of the first story, Georgetown policeman Bill Kinderman (GEORGE C SCOTT) is baffled by a series of murders that bare the marks of the Gemini Killer.

Yet the Gemini was executed 15 years previously - on the very same night Kinderman saw priest Damien Karras (JASON MILLER) die after falling from a bedroom window during an exorcism on teenager Regan McNeil.

Kinderman's trail leads to the local hospital and a high-security isolation ward where a formally catatonic patient claims to be the Gemini Killer (BRAD DOURIF)...yet who looks exactly like Damien Karras.

A TROUBLED PRODUCTION

Although William Peter Blatty's shooting script was substantially different from both his novel and an early adapted screenplay, the studio infamously ordered its own changes after viewing his director's cut.

These included adding an awkward 'exorcism' subplot and 'exorcist' character - including an overblown finale - where none previously existed. The name was changed to EXORCIST III and all promotion and advertising of the film leaned heavily on the name and added theatrics.

THE FANEDIT

This fanedit removes the ill-fitting exorcism subplot and recreates the lower-key ending Blatty intended. No exorcism, no exorcist, no bug-eyed Fr. Karras or special effects mayhem.

It also softens or fixes some inconsistencies, tightens some scenes, and ties the film more closely with the character of Fr Damien Karras from THE EXORCIST.

While aiming to be faithful in spirit to the shooting script as it stood at the start of filming, that version of the script remains unpublished - its exact contents unknown - and all cut footage is now believed lost. The story therefore has been re-imagined with available materials.

EDITS/CUTS/ADDITIONS & MAIN FEATURES

* Approx. 15 minutes cut, 3 minutes added
* No exorcist Father Morning and no exorcism
* A re-creation of the shooting script's ending, closer to Blatty's intentions
* A coda, shorter and different from the original
* New B&W prologue of Fr Karras' final moments, using footage from THE EXORCIST
* Several new lines of dialogue and several altered lines
* Quite a few other little changes and remixes