The Devils (Ken Russell, 1971)

[nicolas]

Details on the restoration of The Devils: https://forum.blu-ray.com/showpost.php? ... tcount=557

[colinr0380]

Mark Kermode after a screening at Lincoln Center. I particularly like his linking the themes of the film forward to Tommy.

And I do like putting The Devils in a tradition of poetic British cinema in a lineage from Powell & Pressburger. You could see how Derek Jarman would pick up that similar mantle in his own films afterwards too. Though I slightly disagree with Kermode that it should not be underestimated just how big a year 1971 was for powerfully confrontational films - Warner Bros by itself had a provocative year with A Clockwork Orange and John Boorman's Deliverance all presenting material that still remains challenging and relevant to this day. And a lot of that probably had to do with a very specific period between the decline of the studio system in the US, and before the rise of the Blockbusters with Jaws, that were leading to studios taking chances on all sorts of material, allowing the opportunities for such films to get made.

[Mr.DarjeelingLimited]

I can’t help but wonder if the “Clockwork” division tried to push this out first because the braindead execs at Paramount () would try to bury it.

[Finch]

Re Ellisons, you can also forget anything vaguely critical of Israel getting made under their leadership.

[Altair]

I can’t help but wonder if the “Clockwork” division tried to push this out first because the braindead execs at Paramount () would try to bury it.

Not that Warner Bros. has been any kind of supporter of this film for most of the past five decades...

[Matt]

Given that the re-release was announced in early May, I would think restoration of the film was well underway before Paramount made their bid for WBD at the end of February.

[Drucker]

I do think that everyone knowing that Warners would be sold probably motivated some people. Was Netflix going to restore this film?

[Lowry_Sam]

Lobby standee for The Devils weighs 666 lbs., I'm sure Ken would be amused.

[olmo]

Re Ellisons, you can also forget anything vaguely critical of Israel getting made under their leadership.

The Devils indeed.

[Altair]

I saw this in 35mm at the Alamo Drafthouse in San Francisco - lovely, organic grain, cool blue-to-grey colour tones, but overall looked immaculate. Really hard to imagine a better restoration.

[tenia]

I saw it 3 days ago (on DCP) and it does gorgeous.
"Exciting announcements" to come about home video releases. We might even get one in France.

[j99]

Not that Warner Bros. has been any kind of supporter of this film for most of the past five decades...

No, although they did allow the BFI to release a DVD of the film several years ago, but did not allow a blu ray release, which was an unusual decision. Has there been any announcement about a high definition release this time around? It’s probably the only way I’m going to be able to see it.

[Mr.DarjeelingLimited]

My 35mm screening is in an hour, can’t wait.
After The Devils, I’m seeing You Can See Everything as well.

[Mr Sausage]

Yes, just saw it and the thing looks terrific. I have a taste for hysteria if done with conviction, as this is, so it was a lot of fun to see for the first time, and on the big screen!

I just want to mention that the rating’s board in my province gave this a 13+. Takes a bit of the vinegar out of this oft suppressed, oft condemned bit of cinematic blasphemy to think that I could’ve gained admittance in elementary school! I wonder if the lenient rating has to do with Quebec’s (sometimes misdirected) passion for secularism, currently at something of a pitch. Quebec carried out what it calls the Quiet Revolution in the 60s, where the church was finally prevented from holding any official place in the provincial government, a move the province now regularly celebrates. So all the nudity and sexuality and other things in the movie not appropriate for teenagers is given a pass for its instructive depiction of religious hypocrisy and the dangers of coupling religion and state power. Tho’ I doubt any schools here are rushing to arrange field trips to see it.

[Never Cursed]

I just want to mention that the rating’s board in my province gave this a 13+.

Do a lot of films usually get above that in your province? I know that, for instance, in France, it's very uncommon for a movie to get a rating higher than "forbidden for under 12" (and populating that rating are films like Fat Girl, Blue Is The Warmest Color, and the uncut version of Killer Joe - at the "universal" level are such child-friendly classics as Mulholland Dr., American Beauty, and The Royal Tenenbaums)

[Mr Sausage]

I suspect no, that it’s like in France, but I haven’t payed enough attention to say for sure. But there is for instance a 16+ category, which the current Queer animated comedy, Jim Queen, holds. It’s the only film out now which holds it. What pushes tat one over the edge but not The Devils, I couldn’t say, as the latter gets pretty freaky. Again I don’t wonder if educational benefit was in its favour.

Blue is the Warmest Colour, Killer Joe, and Fat Girl also have 16+. As does Cronenberg’s Crash.

Mulholland Drive, The Royal Tennanbaums, and American Beauty are 13+, so Québec is not quite as permissive as France.

The only things with 18+ I could find on a cursory search were movies like Hostel 2 (but not part 1), Human Centipede 2 (again not part 1), and Martyrs—so films with the most extreme and punishing violence.

But even that’s not a guarantee, as other New French Extremity films like Haute Tension and Inside are 16+, as are all the recent Evil Dead movies.

[Saturnome]

Québec's rating stats are the reverse of the US (where something like 60% of films are R rated I think?) :

2% of films are more than 16+, so it's just not common. From my knowledge, gore is the most important factor. Least important is the swearing.
Meaning that quite a few R rated movies are rated G here. Even some films that used to be rated X, like Medium Cool, is G here.

[TechnicolorAcid]

Caught this tonight at my local cinema and while I had seen, and greatly liked, it before, I think it’s fair to say that the experience of watching an uncensored, beautifully restored cut of this in front of a massive screen is essentially the same as watching this for the first time. There’s a quote that kept popping into my head during my viewing about how Russell’s work is at its absolute best when you can’t escape from the sound or imagery in them and that sense of being unable to look away from The Devils’ proceedings makes it feel like an unholy nightmare as it presents a society on the brink of internal collapse, eager to unite but doing so through the persecution and removal of the safety barriers of the Protestants, an eerie echo of Catholic violence against Protestants in Northern Ireland during the film’s release. Yet Russell’s film is not just a film meant to shock its viewers, managing to not only be a consistently funny black comic but also a film of warmth as well.
The most obvious example of The Devils’ warmth is in the spiritual journey Father Grandeur goes through, facilitated by his wife who acts as Grandeur’s foil in her piousness and innocence compared to everyone else in the film. Their relationship is the heart of the film, a chance for meaning in an otherwise cruel world and it’s no surprise that their scenes together are paired with some of the film’s most gorgeous images and landscapes: never-ending, colorful fields of flowers and serene lakes in a film otherwise populated by colorless walls and wastelands.
That is, again, the most clear-cut example of Russell’s moments of empathy given to his characters, yet there’s another scene that I think will equally stay in my mind as much as Grandeur’s spiritual journey did. It’s a moment right before Grandeur is set to go to trial and he is about to have his head shaved but before he does, he asks to see himself one last time before the haircut begins. At first, Russell seems to deny him the possibility of such a catharsis as one of the guards comments that there are no mirrors in the house and thus is unable to carry out Grandeur’s wish, another act of cruelty in a film full of them. Until suddenly, the Baron (who the film has, up until now, presented as an antagonistic force to Grandeur) offers him a reflective silver bowl to look into instead and as he hands it to him, there’s a look in his eyes of respect and sadness for the priest that took off guard when I caught in the cinema because of how genuinely earnest it felt.
I point all of this out because I do think that as a result of the excellent & painterly visuals and the slew of horrific moments imbedded into the soul of The Devils, it is easy to overlook how much Russell operates on an empathetic level here, especially in regards to Vanessa Redgrave’s Sister Jeanne as well, a woman spiritually broken by self-hatred and obsession before then getting physically broken in an attempt to get her to call Father Grandeur the devil (a moment that, when it does happen, Russell makes sure we understand the psychological toll such an action has on Sister Jeanne’s psyche in perhaps one of the most harrowing moments in the film).
Overall, this is a masterpiece and I implore everyone to see Russell’s film in theaters when you all get the chance, it is a life-changing experience to say the least.

[colinr0380]

I would agree - for a film that begins at such a (literal!) fever pitch and maintains such a bombastic, in your face general tone of callous cruelty, it completely has a grasp of the importance how powerful the smaller, easily overlooked moments of humanity are. The true spirituality almost smothered beneath the extravagantly faux display of overwhelming excess.

Even the Executioner at the end tries to be sympathetic to Grandier in giving him a quick death, albeit thrawtedly so. I think in that moment with the mirror (and you could even extend this on a larger scale to the 'chorus' of nuns pressed to back up Sister Jeanne's 'possession') you can see the put upon ordinary members of the society being forced to carry out their roles, and having to themselves wrestle with their own complicity in the fakery of the situation, whilst the true Devils are those who get to give the orders and then stand back and watch others dance to their tune. The character played by Murray Melvin is the perhaps the most interesting one in this respect, because with his mid-level status he is caught between two worlds, seduced and appalled (but always damnedly fascinated) by events in turn.