Le Diable pour alibi

The Devil On Trial might be interesting for people that liked The Conjuring. I'm one of them that enjoy that kind of stories. Do I believe all those things really happened? To be honest, not really, and this documentary turns more towards that way towards the end. Overall it's well made, the re-enactment looks believable, but I doubt that The Warrens are what they say they are. To me they look like conmen in this documentary and because of that all The Conjuring movies look more unrealistic from now on. The Devil On Trial is just for people that like easy entertainment, in this case a horror story based on true or false events. That's up to you to decide.

Did he also make me watch it? No pun intended of course. Real life crime things - are they called documentaries as well? Doesn't matter actually I reckon - I try not to watch too many of those, but this popped up in my "this could interest you" list ... and I thought I'd give it a go.

The Exorcist was based on a real life incident ... so I reckon there is some merit to this. Still or maybe because I just re-watched the whole series and it is not or does not fare well for this here in particular. The movie is well researched and it is fine I reckon. You can believe what you want (no pun intended here either) ... and if you believe hard enough things may manifest .. or work out for you (maybe not so well for others) ... are we not responsible for our own actions then? Well, I don't think the movie is answering any questions of that sort ...

The entire first hour of this documentary plays out like a horror film, and when I realized early on that it's a re-imagining of the third Conjuring film, the events were less impactful. I'd read about the Glatzel case at the time, and while it seemed interesting from a cinematic perspective, I doubt there was enough material for it to be explored as a matter-of-fact documentary. But here, the makers chose not to go that route and spent almost 55-60 minutes detailing supernatural events that may or may not have happened, with scenes re-created in the style of a typical horror flick (replete with jumpscares).

It's only the final 20 minutes or so, that the titular case comes under question. The demonic possession plea was never accepted to begin with, and therefore, it really has no value in any of the proceedings. What did surprise me is how Netflix also decided to question the Warrens' approach to media and money-making when it has several films from The Conjuring universe in its catalog. That, to me, was an interesting take.

The first 3/4 of the show was made like a movie, including some scar factors, it was like watching the conjuring movie that was amateurish. Ed warren actor had a cast that looked exactly like him, which was a plus. The acting was pretty ok and watchable. Pacing was pretty much here and there with some unintended funny scenes and sound effects.

The truths included what actually happened from a third perspective, which was something that has never been shown elsewhere(not that I know of). People who believed in the original story would probably hate it.

Overall I had a good lunch watching this.

A young boy is apparently being possessed by a demon. David sees visions, hears things, sounds demonic, and needs an intervention from the Catholic church. A murder happens, and an interesting defence is put forward.

I'm not totally convinced here, it was a watchable hour or so, but it didn't really have a lot of meat on the bone as it were. Sure it's out in time for Halloween, but the wonderfully imagery doesn't quite tell the whole story, yes it's about possession, but it's very talky.

Your enjoyment level is going to depend on where you sit on the whole debate of demons and possessions being real or not. I looked for a plausible solution, for me it felt as though were presented with a very credible one.

Let's applaud it for not being made into a six part series, it's pretty brief, and there is some interesting content, and some startling footage. You will see heavy influences for horror films, those were interesting to spot.

Sominex, wow that advert was quite something, that was a pretty unexpected twist.

6/10.