Repossessed: The best demonic possession moviesBy Oliver Johnston| October 26, 2021 Movie Blogs This page contains affiliate links. At no additional cost to you, we may earn a commission if you click through and make a purchase. Learn more Hollywood loves nothing more than reviving existing intellectual property that it already owns the rights to. This is the entertainment industry version of resurrecting a dead horse so it can be brutally flogged all over again. Please accept YouTube cookies to play this video. By accepting you will be accessing content from YouTube, a service provided by an external third party. YouTube privacy policy If you accept this notice, your choice will be saved and the page will refresh. Accept YouTube Content The announcement of a reboot or continuation of an old movie or TV show is always accompanied by a gushing statement, allegedly from the cast and crew, claiming that they’re overjoyed at being able to introduce beloved characters and whatnot to a new audience, or words to that effect. Hollywood publicists probably have a template for these statements, filed alongside templates for apologies from celebrities accused of sexual misconduct and racism. Half a century ago… The Exorcist was released in 1973, and the new film continuation of the story (a whole new trilogy, naturally) is due in 2023. Cue the resurrection and flogging, and don’t be surprised when the first new film is inevitably scheduled to be released on the original’s 50th anniversary. But at least the continuation has potential. It’s to be directed by David Gordon Green, who did a decent job of reviving the Halloween franchise. Original star Ellen Burstyn is set to return, and she’ll be in her 90s by the time the new film is released. And how many Hollywood productions starring women in their 90s who aren’t Betty White do audiences get a chance to see these days? Sequels, prequels, and a spin-off In terms of depicting demonic possession, The Exorcist hasn’t been surpassed in the five decades that have gone by since Linda Blair first projectile vomited on the big screen. Yes, there were appalling sequels, not to mention the weird duelling prequels from 2004 and 2005. Warner Bros. didn’t care for the film delivered by Paul Schrader (director of American Gigolo and writer of Taxi Driver). They in fact commissioned a new one from Renny Harlin (whose Cutthroat Island once held the record for the biggest box office flop of all time). Both were ghastly. David Gordon Green announced that his new trilogy would follow on from all the sequels and prequels, unlike his Halloween reboot which disregarded everything after the original. The new Exorcist will probably forget about the short-lived TV series, which had Geena Davis playing a character who turned out to be the adult version of Regan from the original film. This was presumably intended as a shocking twist for the three or four people still watching the series by that point. But 2023 is a long way away, so what are some of the best demonic possession films you can add to your collection while waiting for a woman in her 90s to battle the forces of Satan? The Last Exorcism (2010) Please accept YouTube cookies to play this video. By accepting you will be accessing content from YouTube, a service provided by an external third party. YouTube privacy policy If you accept this notice, your choice will be saved and the page will refresh. Accept YouTube Content An evangelical minister who has performed a great number of exorcisms (as you do) is disillusioned about the fact that he didn’t believe any of the individuals to actually be possessed. In a mockumentary format, he agrees to perform his last exorcism, debunking the process. Unsurprisingly, it turns out that there’s very much a demon in the house. It’s remarkable that a film so reliant on clichés manages to be utterly terrifying. The Blair Witch Project has a lot to answer for, but the mockumentary format is well-used here, aided by the old trick of casting actors nobody outside of their immediate family has heard of, helping to further suspend disbelief. Buy it: UK: Check prices here USA: Check prices here Canada: Check prices here Possession (1981) Please accept YouTube cookies to play this video. By accepting you will be accessing content from YouTube, a service provided by an external third party. YouTube privacy policy If you accept this notice, your choice will be saved and the page will refresh. Accept YouTube Content Sometimes you want a good old-fashioned jump scare. Sometimes you want to truly be disturbed. If you’re in the mood for the latter, director Andrzej Żuławski’s unsettling (and just plain bonkers) film is for you. Mark (Sam Neill) is a spy who returns home to a disintegrating marriage to his wife Anna (Isabelle Adjani). It would all be relatively straightforward if it wasn’t for the eerie doppelgängers he keeps encountering, and the creature lurking in an abandoned house next to the Berlin Wall. Is Mark suffering from profound mental illness, or is it a case of… well, the film’s title should give you a clue. Buy it: UK: Check prices here USA: Check prices here Canada: Check prices here Requiem (2006) Please accept YouTube cookies to play this video. By accepting you will be accessing content from YouTube, a service provided by an external third party. YouTube privacy policy If you accept this notice, your choice will be saved and the page will refresh. Accept YouTube Content Anneliese Michel was a German woman who died in 1976. After displaying apparent signs of psychosis (thought to be caused by her temporal lobe epilepsy), Anneliese’s family thought the only explanation was demonic possession, and the local Catholic church eventually (and reluctantly) permitted an exorcism. No spoilers, but it didn’t end well. This story was dramatised in 2005’s The Exorcism of Emily Rose (which should be avoided like COVID-19), and then the following year in the German drama Requiem, which aims to tell the story with as little sentimentality as possible, and ends up being thoroughly harrowing. Buy it: UK: Check prices here USA: Check prices here Canada: Check prices here Suspiria (2018) Please accept YouTube cookies to play this video. By accepting you will be accessing content from YouTube, a service provided by an external third party. YouTube privacy policy If you accept this notice, your choice will be saved and the page will refresh. Accept YouTube Content Luca Guadagnino’s 2018 remake was a loving homage that managed to be incredibly entertaining, maintaining the relentlessly unsettling atmosphere of Dario Argento’s 1977 original, and arguably deepening it. Suzy (Dakota Johnson) arrives at a renowned West Berlin dance academy to begin her lessons, only to find that all is not what it seems (but it’s a horror film, so, duh). Witchcraft, deceit, possession, and Tilda Swinton playing three different roles – what more does anyone need? Buy it: UK: Check prices here USA: Check prices here Canada: Check prices here The Evil Dead (1981) Please accept YouTube cookies to play this video. By accepting you will be accessing content from YouTube, a service provided by an external third party. YouTube privacy policy If you accept this notice, your choice will be saved and the page will refresh. Accept YouTube Content Sometimes demons can be banished by a priest saying a few strategic holy words while a wind machine kicks into overdrive, and sometimes they just need to be chainsawed. Sam Raimi’s beautifully grotesque film chooses the latter option. Taking the more is more approach, The Evil Dead is an orgy of blood, intercut with some genuinely frightening elements. Surprisingly, the impact was maintained throughout its two sequels, reboot, and spin-off TV series. Buy it: UK: Check prices here USA: Check prices here Canada: Check prices here Jennifer’s Body (2009) Please accept YouTube cookies to play this video. By accepting you will be accessing content from YouTube, a service provided by an external third party. YouTube privacy policy If you accept this notice, your choice will be saved and the page will refresh. Accept YouTube Content Megan Fox is often dismissed as eye candy, with Michael Bay’s camera lingering over her toned physique in a pervy way that jump-started puberty in the young male viewers of the original Transformers. But Megan Fox, feminist icon? At the time, Jennifer’s Body was seen as a disruption to writer Diablo Cody’s hot streak after winning an Oscar for Juno, but the interpretation of the film has changed over the years, and it has been described as a feminist classic. It’s hard being a young woman. It’s even harder being a young woman who offers herself as a virgin sacrifice to Satan in exchange for success, only to be possessed because she wasn’t in fact a virgin. Buy it: UK: Check prices here USA: Check prices here Canada: Check prices here
