ken russell's the devils

[ed miliband]

tPConeKY3WA

anyone seen it?

i've just bought the bfi release of the original british cut, which is still missing the infamous 'rape of christ' scene. i mean, i've been dying to watch it for years simply to see how fucked up it really is, but reading more about it it's clearly a very serious piece of work -- set design by derek jarman, score by peter maxwell davies, parts of the script based on an aldous huxley novel, and so on. it's also meant to be highly politically charged, and some speculate that it's this factor that has led to the film basically being hidden from the public for so long.

so yeah, interesting stuff.

[Os Cangaceiros]

I've seen it. It's good. Although it's not as shocking today as it probably was back then, as blasphemy in general really isn't as shocking to today's audiences. One thing I do remember was that the sets were kind of..."fake looking" but also kind of cool. Plus the scenes of naked or semi-naked people writhing around under Satan's spell or whatever.

One of the main reasons I like it is just because Oliver Reed is in it (he plays a hedonistic Jesuit priest). He's probably one of my favorite actors.

[brigadista]

one of the greatest brit films -

ken russell never deserved the credit his films merited


not a novel by aldous huxley but based on his account of actual events -

see
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loudun_possessions

[Pirate Utopian]

It's a good movie. Cool little artsy nunsploitation horror.

[ed miliband]

I've seen it. It's good. Although it's not as shocking today as it probably was back then, as blasphemy in general really isn't as shocking to today's audiences. One thing I do remember was that the sets were kind of..."fake looking" but also kind of cool. Plus the scenes of naked or semi-naked people writhing around under Satan's spell or whatever.

One of the main reasons I like it is just because Oliver Reed is in it (he plays a hedonistic Jesuit priest). He's probably one of my favorite actors.

was reading some of the booklet that came with the dvd and a passage mentioned a catholic theologian who has done studies on the film and argues it's not at all blasphemous but a representation of blasphemy. okay, that's probably not a very meaningful distinction but i do think it's pretty interesting that russell made the film as a practicing catholic and had even tried to secure funding for a number of projects from the 'catholic cultural office' or something like that.

[Os Cangaceiros]

The movie is definitely not "anti-Catholic", IMO. It's not really even a criticism of religious extremism, as the villains in the film pretty much knew that what they were doing was BS, they were doing it for purely political reasons. The film portrays religion as something that has been used as a tool of oppression by those in power, but honestly I think that's simply an indisputable fact.

In fact the hero of the story, the main character, is a Catholic priest who is persecuted for defending his town against a corrupt and decadent aristocracy.

[ed miliband]

The movie is definitely not "anti-Catholic", IMO. It's not really even a criticism of religious extremism, as the villains in the film pretty much knew that what they were doing was BS, they were doing it for purely political reasons. The film portrays religion as something that has been used as a tool of oppression by those in power, but honestly I think that's simply an indisputable fact.

In fact the hero of the story, the main character, is a Catholic priest who is persecuted for defending his town against a corrupt and decadent aristocracy.

agree with all of that, and i thought it was an incredible film. feel bad for imagining it was just some fun schlock.

oliver reed was brilliant, and again i feel bad for thinking he was just a loveable drunk.

[ed miliband]

thought the set design was brilliant also, yeah it looked sort of fake but apparently russell wanted the sets to look like a “a rape in a public lavatory" -- i think jarman captured that, particularly in the nunnery.