FAQ

According to many sources, not very. The film is based on stories of a supposed poltergeist case near London, where two preteen girls were haunted by strange noises, knockings, and other weird phenomena. The film depicts noted demonologists Ed and Lorraine Warren as primary investigators and heroes of the story, when actually they were not involved with the actual poltergeist case, which was investigated by the UK's Society for Psychical Research. Those in charge, Maurice Grosse and Guy Lyon Playfair, both state that the Warrens showed up uninvited after reading media reports of the haunting, were refused entrance to the house, and hung around on the street for most of the day before leaving. Grosse and Playfair believed the haunting to have been genuine, while other SPR investigators (namely Anita Gregory and John Beloff) believed it to have been a hoax. Many subsequent researchers and investigators have believed it to have been a hoax as well.