In theaters: THE EXORCIST: THE BEGINNING, directed by Renny Harlin, written by Alexi Hawley, 114 minutes, rated R.

So it wasn’t meant to be, but here it is and there you have it. Break out the Holy water folks – the devil had a time of it in Hollywood.

Smote by problems from the start, “The Exorcist: The Beginning” – a prequel to Williams Friedkin’s 1973 classic horror movie “The Exorcist” – is just what you expect from a film that has been looping in and out of production for the better part of three years.

Along its storied way, the movie went through three different directors: William Friedkin, who died during production; Paul Schrader, who was given a fiery send-off after failing to produce a scary film; and Renny Harlin, who apparently came along to muck the whole thing up with his own version, which is reviewed here.

Also plaguing the movie were major rewrites, cast changes, production shifts and differences in opinion from all sides that ultimately worked to create a film that just doesn’t work.

As written by Alexi Hawley, “The Exorcist: The Beginning” is an ugly, unnecessary, sometimes grotesquely violent abomination that dips deep into Hollywood’s unquenchable thirst for sequels and prequels to popular films.

It joins 1977’s “The Exorcist II: The Heretic” and 1990’s “The Exorcist III” in missing what made “The Exorcist” so great – attention to characters we came to care about, situations and dialogue that were realistic. It’s those elements – not the vomiting of pea soup, the rattling of a bed or the spinning of a child’s head – that gave audiences a stake in the movie. Yes, the special effects helped to sell it, but they were just icing delivered with aplomb.

Here, they’re delivered in a bomb that tries to flesh out the early years of Father Merrin, the priest who helped rid poor Regan of the devil in the first film.

In this film, Merrin (Stellan Skarsgard, taking over for Max Von Sydow) is a former priest trying to find himself in 1949 Cairo. There, in between drinks, he learns about an archaeological dig in Kenya that involves the discovery of a buried Christian Byzantine church. That proves especially curious to Merrin since no church of that type should be in the area – buried or otherwise.

When he arrives, there’s chaos and disorder, with thousands of flies hovering over a site they apparently wants no one to enter. Naturally, Merrin and a priest (James D’Arcy) enter, which unleashes a series of Beelzebub events that involve the alleged possession of a boy, and then predictably, the endless graphic deaths of so many others. This includes stillborn babies covered in maggots, hyenas brutally ripping apart a young villager, death by suicide, and other atrocities, some of which involve those old standbys, the Nazis.

Izabella Scorupco is the troubled doctor with the revealing shower scene, the ever-dewy breasts and the dirty secret. She looks waxy and unreal, an automated version of one of Madame Tussaud’s dummies, with her acting just as stiff. If it weren’t for Skarsgard, who is a good actor doing his best here, “The Exorcist: The Beginning” would have been left with a final F.

Grade: D-

On video and DVD

TAKING LIVES, directed by D.J. Caruso, written by Jon Bokenkamp, based on the novel by Michael Pye, 103 minutes, rated R.

In spite of a benign title and the fact that it inexplicably tries to pass Quebec City off as Montreal, the grisly thriller “Taking Lives” initially gives you hope that the serial killer genre might not be dead after all.

The film creates a controlled mood of tense unease. In it, a drifter is brutally murdered by a young man who quickly assumes his victim’s identity.

Twenty years later, the bodies start to pile up again. Unable to get a handle on the case, the baffled French Canadian police seek the help of Angelina Jolie’s Illeana Scott, a savvy FBI profiler who can lie in a victim’s grave and give specifics on how they got there.

Freakish? Yes. And not surprisingly, Illeana isn’t exactly welcomed by some of the cops working the case. Still, she proves invaluable when an eye-witness to a new murder is called in for questioning.

His name is James Coster (Ethan Hawke), he’s an art dealer and how he recounts what he saw generates a mystery. Either he’s the murderer or he’s in danger of being hunted down by the real murderer, who might just be an angry tough guy played by Keifer Sutherland.

Which is it? That’s anyone’s guess, though Illeana does side with Coster, which sets the movie up for a steamy romance, several well-done chase scenes and one noteworthy jolt that lifts the movie.

Unfortunately, just when it appears that this is going to be a reasonably smart, atmospheric thriller of note, the film jack-knifes into a series of audacious plot twists that break it in two. The ending is particularly absurd, a major cheat with a mean edge that goes too far doesn’t add up, which brings the entire movie down.

Grade: C

Christopher Smith is the Bangor Daily News film critic. His reviews appear Mondays and Fridays in Style, 5:30 p.m. Thursdays on WLBZ 2 Bangor and WCSH 6 Portland, and are archived at RottenTomatoes.com. He may be reached at BDNFilm1@aol.com.