The Devil Made Me Do It. Or Maybe It Was Being Homeschooled

When done right, demonic possession is a something that can disturb movie viewers like few other horror tropes. Sure, the idea of seeing our friends rise from the dead to eat our brains is discomforting and tearing our clothing every full moon cycle sounds unpleasant, but the idea of something evil inhabiting our own body as we sit trapped inside is a deeply dark level of human horror. There’s a reason The Exorcist had the effect it did on Friday night movie house audiences, and while I’ll personally always prefer its third telling, I can certainly understand why William Friedken’s work turned stomachs and twisted minds in the 1970s.

Exorcismus has an interesting angle to take on the possession theme. Much like the rather outstanding The Last Exorcism, it toys with the idea of repression and adolescence as the cause/explanation of what might not actually be a demon inhabitation. It’s a good start.

Quick Plot: Emma is your typically moody 15 year old teenager with a less common problem: being home-schooled by her square dad and super Catholic mom alongside her younger do-gooder brother. That kind of schedule can drive a young woman to extremes, be they hanging out with ill-behaved friends or, you know, slicing open her palm to invite Satan in to party.

After getting strange visions of cockroach infestation, having seizures in the kitchen and maybe causing her psychologist’s heart attack, Emma’s problem becomes a tad more serious. Thankfully--or not--her uncle John happens to be a priest with his own experience/failure performing exorcisms on teenage girls. 

The main thrust of Exorcismus is the constant questioning of whether or not Emma is indeed possessed. On that front, the film has some interesting themes to play with. Emma is unhappy being home-schooled and the results have built up a solid frustration souring her on all fronts, especially towards her family. Even Emma herself is unsure whether the demon inside her is of supernatural origin. For all she knows, it may be mental illness that her overeager uncle is simply too quick to misdiagnose.

Exorcismus is a well-directed and acted film (even underneath British dubbing), but it never seemed to reel me in. Filmed in a close, occasionally shaky-cam style, it has an effectively claustrophobic feel that does well in capturing Emma’s own confused psyche.   At the same time, the story’s reluctance to ever commit to horror or family drama goes on too long to the point where its final decision comes more with a ‘finally’ than ‘a-ha!’

High Notes

Yes, you’ve also seen it in The Last Exorcism, but the parallels between repressed womanhood and demonic possession are done quite well here, especially in the hands of lead actress Sophie Vavasseur (yes, she's dubbed in the Instant Watch version, but her physical acting is still vital)

Low Notes

Maybe it was Exorcismus’ slow pacing that eventually segues into an awkwardly fit twist, but I just couldn’t truly find my way into the film’s storytelling

Lessons Learned

“Just wait to see if it happens again” is not the best attitude to take when your daughter is having seizures

Catholics get off on all that Satan crap

Car accidents that take place in super slow motion are typically 95% more fatal than those in real time

Rent/Bury/Buy

Available on Instant Watch through IFC Films, Exorcismus is a perfectly competent possession yarn that might indeed lend you some creeps or something to ponder. It never grabbed me, but I won’t deny that Manuel Carballo’s direction had some freshness about it that made the film a decent way to spend 90 minutes or so. Fans of Exorcist-ish cinema will probably enjoy it, while those looking to catch a few minutes of Doug Bradley sans pins in his head will at least get that.

It just doesn’t look right.

Here’s What Happens When You Raise Hell In Less Than 2 Weeks

Filmed in just 11 days, Hellraiser: Revelations is a difficult movie to discuss. This is a bottom of the barrel first draft sequel made purely to hold onto a once successful series’ rights. Even the cynic in me finds it mean to be too hard on the lazy story, messy performances, and ultimate lack of just about anything.

But the movie was made, thus making it fair game…right?

Quick Plot: Oh great, we start with found footage! There’s a way to cut the budget before it’s even estimated.

Two rich bratty suburban teens travel to Mexico to drink tequila and bang prostitutes in bar bathrooms. Yup, I am TOTALLY on these guys’ side already.

Cut to a Very Bad Things-ish accident that leaves uber male Nico in a bit of a bind. After manslaughter, the natural thing to do is to hit up a strip club (right?) where the pair befriend a mysterious American bum who gives them, out of the kindness of his sadistic heart, Pinhead’s vessel box.

All this action is mixed in with an awkward dinner party thrown by Nico and Steve’s grieving parents, who are completely rich and utterly boring. Steve’s teenage sister Emma is also in attendance to mourn the disappearance of her brother and (ick) boyfriend Nico, of whom her parents seem to care less for than the bottle of wine served with steak.

Oh Hellraiser: Revelations. The odds were stacked against you the minute you started filming against the clock. We know that, and can even forgive a shoddy Scottish accent-hiding actor’s shoddy skills at hiding a Scottish accent and a backlot serving as the country of Mexico. But how difficult could it possibly have been to NOT make your characters filthy rich entitled white brats? Are we supposed to WANT to see them skinned and pinned as Cenobite playthings? Or should we actually feel bad for their terrible tortured fate?

The problem with a film as rushed into production as Revelations is that it doesn’t know. A lot of the (pretty awful) Hellraiser sequels have leaned on having unlikable characters as a way to spread out the audience’s alliance. A date with Pinhead shouldn’t be wished on anyone, but it certainly makes viewers feel better if the victim deserves some form of punishment.

Heck, maybe I’m not giving Revelations enough credit. Perhaps the complete intention of filmmaker Victor Garcia was to get us rooting for Pinhead & Co. to win a few fresh bodies. Then again, if that was the plan all along, shouldn’t we…you know…be rooting for Pinhead? That’s a tricky request when for the first time, the lord of pain’s leather bodysuit is NOT being filled by Doug Bradley.

One can’t really fault unlucky actor Stephan Smith Collins for being a lackluster villain. Pinhead isn’t your run-of-the-mill Jason Voorhees or Michael Meyers. He’s far more akin to Freddy Krueger or Chucky, an iconic horror role made as memorable by the actor underneath the makeup as he is by his own mythology. Plopping another man inside his costume doesn’t feel sacrilegious: it just feels silly.

To make up for it, the script crams in every fad in recent horror cinema. Found footage! Home invasion! Crash test dummy Pinhead 2! Okay, the last one’s new, but not necessarily good. Little is in Hellraiser: Revelations.

But hey, that’s what you get for 11 days of shooting. The film runs a quick 75 minutes, little of which makes complete sense. Unlike the majority of the Hellraiser sequels, however, Revelations DOES actually FEEL like a Hellraiser installment. The story is essentially Frank & Julia retold as two awful teenagers who feel isolated in a dreadful youth-gone-wild straight to IFC original. From a screenwriting-in-11-days standpoint, it makes sense: there’s no time for anything complicated, so why not just copy the most successful plot and rewrite it with younger, prettier (by some definition unfamiliar to me) people? It makes sense. But a sensical plan and ELEVEN DAYS OF SHOOTING still do not a good movie make.

High Notes

For all its rushed messiness, the actual gore of Revelations is decently done, especially considering it mostly sticks to practical effects over the easier (as any Asylum vet knows) and uglier CGI

Well-

*mostly*

Low Notes

It’s hard to point fingers at the cast for inhabiting such miserable people, so I guess I’ll blame the studio for greenlighting an incomplete script filled with awful, ill-defined characters that offer nothing to sympathize with

Lessons Learned

Being on someone’s private property means that legally, they can blow your brains out and ask questions later

Before killing a prostitute, make sure you can afford her price

‘Cenobite’ now has a definition in your standard household dictionary

The Asian prostitute population in Mexico is surprisingly large

Getting shot in the stomach by a shotgun blast will kill indeed kill you, but it will take a really long time. Possibly enough time to rewrite your will, run a marathon, or rewatch the entire Hellraiser series

Rent/Bury/Buy

There’s a part of me that really wished Hellraiser: Revelations was worse, or at least, awful in a fun way. Alas, the film isn’t incompetent. Given an actual finished screenplay, I imagine director Victor Garcia can probably make a more than decent film. Instead, we’re stuck with a movie that feels embarrassed that it even had to be made.