Genre

This chapter investigates the genre of Ken Russell's The Devils (1973). Nowadays, it is common to see The Devils lumped in with horror programming, and while identifying the film as belonging to the genre is by no means inaccurate, there is a lot more to say about the film when it comes to classifying it. In many ways, The Devils possibly ends up as a horror film (as opposed to being designed as one), and the more extreme, graphic elements of the film crowd out the other aspects, at least from the general viewer's perspective. But the film very much remains, in essence, as it begins—a historical drama, not being eclipsed by, but rather dovetailing neatly with, its horror elements, which are something of a natural by-product. As such, the largely unnoticed sophistication of the film marked an evolution in screen horror. Rather than setting out to make a horror film or trying to box the film in in terms of genre, Russell simply set about telling his story here, and the genre latterly assigned to The Devils appears to be due to its title as much as its content.

Synopsis

This chapter details the synopsis of Ken Russell's The Devils (1973). Set in seventeenth-century France, the film tells the story of influential secular priest Urbain Grandier, who holds interim powers in the city of Loudun following the death of Governor Sainte-Marthe. A chronic womaniser, the vainglorious Grandier begins a relationship with the daughter of a plague victim. The film also tells the story of Sister Jeanne, the abbess of the local Ursuline convent, who entertains wild sexual fantasies about Grandier and invites him to be the order's new confessor. After being disappointed when Father Mignon became the new confessor instead of Grandier, Sister Jeanne tells Mignon that Grandier is a servant of Satan who has placed her, and the rest of the convent, under a spell of lewd desire. A kangaroo court finds Grandier guilty of sorcery, and he's sentenced to death by burning.

Gender and Sexuality

This chapter focuses on the representation of gender and sexuality in Ken Russell's The Devils (1973). In terms of gender and sexuality, The Devils possess, at its core, a very traditional outlook that is quite a good fit with the philosophies of many of those responsible for the film's critical opprobrium. The protagonist, Grandier, is a red-blooded male and apparently a heartthrob for the majority of Loudun's female population. As he is being tortured in the film's latter stages, Grandier confesses, ‘I have been a man. I have loved women’, clearly seeing the two things as being concordant. This statement also serves to further emasculate Louis XIII. More problematically, there are numerous female characters in The Devils, and the bulk of them are defined through their relationships to/with the louche Grandier—most are in love/lust with the priest and/or driven hysterical by him. Regardless of where they stand on the Grandier spectrum, one thing all these women have in common is that they are infantilised through their relationships with/to the priest. Whether fantasising about Grandier-as-Christ or giving in to her onanistic urges in clear view of one of her equally sex-starved charges, Jeanne is a hysteric whose happiness completely depends on the feelings of a man she's never even met.

Historical Context

This chapter discusses the historical context of Ken Russell's The Devils (1973), as the timing of the first appearance of the film is of great importance in a way which spreads out way beyond the confines of the cinema screen. Despite its firm seventeenth-century setting—and its ongoing relevance—The Devils is very much a film for 1971, and its ideas about spirituality said much about the time in which the film was released. Uncomfortable parallels could also be made with the Troubles in Northern Ireland; this conflict, for which both politics and religion provided much of the fuel, had been underway for some time when The Devils was released. And with the world only starting to recover from the Manson murders, which were deemed to have been committed in order to ignite a race war, the film also served up a scarcely needed reminder of the case's chief bogeyman in the form of Father Barré. Audiences in 1971 certainly had plenty to think about, and The Devils did not provide an easy evening of escapism. The film had much to say to the audience of its time, and the vexatious nature of its message endures to the present day.

Themes

This chapter evaluates the themes prevalent in Ken Russell's The Devils (1973). A key message in The Devils, which creeps up on the audience rather subtly, given Russell's rather unjust reputation as a sledgehammer of a director, concerns the misery and destruction which can result when politics and religion jump into bed together. As the film's final, spectacular shot reveals the ruins of the magnificent city walls shown near the start of the film, the scale of the horror of what has occurred really resonates; these bookends chillingly convey the film's main point. It was Cardinal Richelieu's desire to build a new, centralised (and Protestant-free) France in which, as he puts it to Louis XIII in the opening scene, ‘Church and State are one’, which has led to the destroyed walls of Loudun at the end, and it is clear to see who has blood on their hands. Russell said The Devils was his only political film, and one can just about taste his revulsion at the unholy marriage that has occurred between Church and State; the film presents a compelling argument for the separation of the two entities, which eventually came to pass in France in 1905.