The Devils is a film by Ken Russell, and if you’ve never seen one of his films before, this makes for a great sample to decide if you would have any interest in his other work. He likes multiple layers of odd until it reaches the pitch of a high-speed fever dream. Big ideas debated while a priest defends himself from a sword using a petrified alligator. Everything is played big, and not theatrical big like DePalma but more like a rock concert. Boring this film is not.
While I generally don’t like Ken Russell’s filmmaking, The Devils is the major exception because wild style is the right way to tell this story. Watching factions use religion, sex and politics to manipulate the system gives this Ken Russell film a dramatic weight I have yet to see in his other work. It gives his unusual, sometimes repulsive imagery a stickiness that makes it well worth watching when you’re looking for a movie that isn’t just going to slide into your eyes and ears and then right back out again.
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