Satanis: The Devil's Mass

It's a fairly slow moving look at LeVey's early church that's notable for the mundanity of it all. Sure you have some rituals, nudity, butt whipping, but mostly it's just people talking about following their feelings and outsiders calling them strange. Not much to it, but if you like 53 year old boobs, you're in for a treat!

Although absolutely nothing special, this documentary by Ray Laurent takes us inside the Church of Satan, founded in California in the 1960s by Anton Szandor LaVey, a former circus lion tamer. It has no narrator, and isn't really attempting to tell a story. It's more a series of interviews - with subjects either standing and talking or sitting down and talking - and therefore, it may be rather boring to some viewers. But the material does have a certain fascination and interest level going for it. At least, that was the case for this viewer. Laurent films the perspectives of various witnesses to this phenomenon: neighbors, flock members, opponents, etc., as well as the man himself.

It's not overwhelmingly cinematic, but there are some decent camera angles and movements throughout; the lighting is also noteworthy. The main reason to watch is to see this vintage footage of Mr. LaVey, who comes across as a fairly charismatic, fairly easygoing individual. He based his "religion", if one can call it that, on the idea that humans are basically flawed anyway, and that these flaws could be celebrated and even encouraged. He felt that most organized religion spent too much time condemning people and insisting that they do / not do certain things.

If nothing else, "Satanis: The Devil's Mass" is an amusing enough look at an alternative lifestyle, no matter what one may think of Mr. Lavey's personal beliefs. We are witness to some entertaining decadence: nude women on altars, ass whippings, the expected incantations and rituals, etc. Among the major topics covered are public reactions to the goings-on at LaVey's "Black House" in San Francisco in the 60s, the hassles with the law due to Mr. LaVey having a pet lion at his residence, and his response when confronted with the notion that he may be nothing more than a big phony.

This is worth a look for curiosity seekers, provided they don't get their hopes up too high about it.

Six out of 10.

I caught this on TCM. You have to wonder if the message of the filmmakers is that all Belief Systems are just that: BS. The Satanists are bored and boring. The black house is a second rate curio shop. The naked ladies, to be charitable, could use some time in the gym. The red lighted rituals are pointless. The Christians are predictable: gosh, how were they able to find 2 young babbling Mormon in white shirts and ties? Where did they come up with an old priest to take us back 1700 years to the Gospels? The only thing missing is a sweaty guy in a straw hat yelling "Hurry, hurry, hurry! Right this way to the weirdos!"

A good tool for insomniacs to get some needed sleep.

TCM recently aired this obscurity (with thanks to Something Weird and the American Genre Film Archive for rescuing it). As a film it isn't much: Poorly shot (16mm) with the camera often fumbling around without edits searching for proper framing, barely adequate sound and a lack of basic of explanation of who is being interviewed and the context of LaVey and his followers.

Still, I found this a lot more interesting than its critical reputation would have it. It's very much a 'time capsule' as others have noted. San Francisco in the late 60s has always been embodied in the public mind by Haight-Ashbury, The Summer Of Love and the Hippie movement in general. LaVey and his Church of Satan fit right in even with their Black Mass trappings. Hedonists and free love folks at their core, LeVay and his disciples simply traded their tie-dyes for devil masks and leather - or, just ditched their clothing entirely (though, still in a mostly sexist manner with naked women being the 'altar' objects).

Aside from the Satanic angle, the other thing that made them public pariahs were their embrace of all types of sexual 'perversions' (LaVey's own words). Interestingly, one of those alleged perversions of the era was homosexuality - hey, they were progressives ahead of their time! Why LaVey got tabbed an underground cult leader was his insistence that he was leading a new religion, as foolish as that was. Indeed, the extensive footage here of the group's rituals leads one more towards mockery rather than fear (although the whipping scene is pretty realistic). Try as he does to make the rituals into a horror show, Director Ray Laurent succeeds more in making them look mundane and more than a bit boring. Heck, the Church of Satan didn't even use live animal sacrifices! What kind of devil worshippers don't spill blood?!

But, even at that the film is interesting: Stripped of all the costumes, nudity and devil scripture this was just a bunch of folks gathered together in some guy's darkened living room - so what if an orgy broke out? SATANIS will never be confused with fine filmmaking, but, it's a valuable document of a time and a place. And, probably the best peek at LeVay as a person -- stripped of all the pomp and circumstance -- and fearsome reputation.

In 1966, a one-time circus lion-tamer Anton Szandor LaVey founded The Church of Satan in San Francisco and grandiosely announced the age of Satan had begun, an age that would celebrate the carnal instincts in man, and would be characterized by the mantra of "indulgence instead of abstinence". Although a media non-entity since the early nineties, at the time, the fledging Church shocked and scandalized as much as it bemused and confused…and this was in no small part to LaVey's charisma, showmanship, and effective mixing of blasphemy (compounded in 1968 with the publication of 'The Satanic Bible') and of horror B-movie imagery which left many asking if it was just a racket, a reason to get naked for it's largely well-to-do white middle-class membership, or indeed had darker aspirations.

However, this documentary in choosing to sacrifice the weightier aspects of the Church to the titillating nude alters and B-movie lighting offers such a superficial treatment that for those for whom "Satanis" is their introduction to LaVey and the Church, the reaction of snide dismissal is totally understandable. The documentary is basically composed of three strands: talking heads of neighbours (both sympathetic and antagonistic) and Church members; extended scenes of Satanic rituals; and interviews with LaVey. The ritual scenes begin as interesting but quickly become stale and interminable and (most boringly) designed to titillate…a theme which re-emerges when members of the Church discuss sex and masturbation and, despite supposedly being advocates of the flesh liberated from Judeo-Christian conceptions of shame, giggle like pathetic teenagers (something which visibly irks LaVey as he tries to talk). In the end the only interesting pieces of the documentary (few and far between) are the interviews with LaVey himself as he waxes lyrical on the tenets of his Church with an energy and enthusiasm he would lose in later years, something evident in the still-patchy-but-much-better later documentary "Speak of the Devil" (www.imdb.com/title/tt0183811/reviews-4).

All in all, I would only recommend "Satanis" to people who are already acquainted with the Church of Satan and want to get a feel of what the first few years must have been like as to those coming to the Church for the first time would be forgiven for not seeing the nuances and complexities inherent in the organization. I recommend the documentary "Speak of the Devil" for its more mature approach and focus on LaVey himself but for those really seeking knowledge on the Church I recommend the authoritative and comprehensive book "The Church of Satan" by Michael Aquino available to download for free. Shemhamforash indeed.