In the new found footage possession movie Name the Demon, a desperate husband allows an exorcism on his possessed wife, but there may be more to this run-of-the-mill possession story than initial impressions let on.
Name the Demon is out today and will be available on the free with ads streaming service that just keeps on giving: Tubi!
Back in July, I was contacted by the team behind Name the Demon. They would trade me an opportunity to watch the screener in return for an honest review. I’m usually a bit reluctant to say yes to this kind of thing since I generally like to stick to positive reviews, so I’m happy to say despite this being very much a shoestring indie film it was a delightful appetizer to my 13th annual #31HorrorFilms31Days every October.
Get ready to *gameshow voice* “name…that…demon!”
Spoiler Free Synopsis
The movie presents itself as found footage from a court case. We initially see footage of a loving married couple named David and Anna excitedly talking about expecting their first child. Anna then expresses concern about the possibility of having a daughter because of something that happened when they lived on the east coast.
After some exposition explaining there’s been a spike in requests for exorcisms the past 15 years, we jump to footage of two priests and a deacon walking into David and Anna’s home to conduct an exorcism on her. The deacon is there to record everything for transparency. There is also a nice nod to The Exorcist.
The husband David is clearly put off by the idea of the exorcism but he is also desperate for help. Anna has been acting erratically for weeks and even though he doesn’t believe in Catholicism, it seems that Anna still does. To make things more tense, their young daughter Grace is present and forced to endure the horrific turmoil her parents are going through.
Initial Impressions
First thing’s first: this is a capital “I” Indie Film. It isn’t “I’m watching a home movie” level quality. But it is clearly filmed in someone’s actual house and the acting can leave something to be desired at times.
On the flipside, this movie does have some tense sequences and the type of story that intentionally keeps you revaluating your assumptions about the situation. If you like the type of horror movie that makes you second guess all the main characters and if something supernatural is even happening at all, you will like the intrigue at the heart of this film.
If you like horror films that know how to pull their punches and show you creepy “blink and you miss it” things in the background without immediately resorting to loud jump scares, you will love some of the background scares in this. I caught a few more on my second watch I missed the first time, and I appreciate filmmakers who throw little moments like that in without making them overtly obvious.
Unlike many found footage movies, this is shot in real time and there is purpose to why the camera continues to roll even as things go increasingly off the rails. I’m never really bothered by the conceit of found footage, and a lot of times it makes the situation feel more realistic and tragic to me than more polished mainstream horror releases. It can really feel like you are watching everyday people go from being lighthearted to being completely broken down by the evil that infiltrates their lives. Unfortunately, Name the Demon often feels a little too carefully scripted and stilted which makes it lose that feeling of realistic dread that found footage can generate. There is a lot more dialogue and a lot less “peek a boo” style running around with the camera hunting for jump scares (although there’s a particularly tense and prolonged “peek a boo” sequence near the end that was quite unnerving). The amount of dialogue helps bolster the suspicion and paranoia that creeps into the story, but also gives it a stage play vibe that didn’t entirely work for me.
This is also a possession movie, which admittedly is not a subgenre I’m a fan of. There’s only so much of watching a possessed woman screaming at priests who are screaming back at her I am interested in watching. But at least in this, Jessie Nerud’s performance as Anna is really a highlight that makes those moments more palatable. The extra layer of wondering if this was more of A Headful of Ghosts situation as opposed to a straightforward possession made those scenes more interesting too.
Another part of this film I love is how many times the men go up to the room Anna is in, she wilds out as possessed characters are prone to do, and they almost immediately scuttle out of the room as fast as possible to try and regroup. It is played as a straightforward “nope!” every time, but once again adds to how people might realistically act in such an outlandish situation.
Another refreshing element of the movie is that it doesn’t pretend there isn’t controversy surrounding the Catholic Church after the shocking sex abuse scandals of the early 2000s. Or how it would look to see a disheveled man looking like Jack Torrance post his ghost-whiskey bender with a loaded gun tucked into his waistband insisting his wife who has been confined to the bedroom is the one with the issues.
One of my favorite moments is when a neighbor named Simon is summoned over to watch the Grace. Simon is immediately taken aback seeing two priests and a deacon with a camera (incidentally the name of a reality show I’m developing) in his face upon arrival. Still, Simon regains himself enough to immediately start talking shit in the form of exposition which was unintentionally hilarious to me. Simon came over and served tea right in the foyer without a second thought and I love him for that.
Another minor thing I have to point out is wtf was going on with the hoarder basement in this house?!
Aside from the hoarder basement, there are some nasty little moments at the end of this. Some were genuinely a bit surprisingly, and some shoot for the moon but land among the finale of The Room in terms of overwrought melodrama. But a indie horror film with some interesting storytelling, themes, and gore is still a solid one if you can get past some of the parts that are lacking. My hope for this movie would be for it to eventually be picked up by a studio and remade into a longer film that could better explore some of the different ideas it brings up.
TL;DR
Name the Demon is a serviceable found footage possession movie with some effective moments and interesting ideas behind the scares. It makes me think of the Neil Patrick Harris’s quote “Magic is like pizza. Even when it’s bad, it’s pretty good.” For me, the same can be said about beer or horror films. Even when it’s Domino’s, it still hits the spot when you are craving it.
A Huffle of Horror 