Dir: Ken Russell
Cast: Vanessa Redgrave, Oliver Reed, Dudley Sutton
112mins · 1971 · UK · Cert 18 · English
The Devils
Introduced by Depot team member and freelance film programmer Katie Spooner
Inspired by the true story of 17th-century priest Urbain Grandier, accused of bewitching a convent of nuns, The Devils lays bare the collusion of church and state through a searing vision of religious persecution, collective hysteria and institutional corruption.
Oliver Reed gives one of his greatest performances as Grandier, opposite an extraordinary Vanessa Redgrave as Sister Jeanne, whose repressed desire unleashes a religious and sexual mania.
Derek Jarman’s visionary production design and Shirley Russell’s striking costumes help create a feverish world at once historical and startlingly modern.
Censored from its original release, Russell’s film became one of cinema’s most legendarily compromised works. This long-anticipated restoration reaffirms The Devils as an overwhelming, uncompromising and singular achievement of British cinema.
- _James Bell, BFI National Archive Senior Curator_
_If you would like information about the content of this film, including potentially triggering material, please CLICK HERE for guidance from the BBFC_
