Ken Russell's Film of The Devils (1971)
The Devils (1971) [Uncut] + Extras
DVDRip | AVI | 720 x 400 | XviD @ 1922 Kbps | English MP3 @ 128 Kbps | 108 min | 1,50 Gb + 942 Mb
Genre: Drama, Art-house
DVDRip | AVI | 720 x 400 | XviD @ 1922 Kbps | English MP3 @ 128 Kbps | 108 min | 1,50 Gb + 942 Mb
Genre: Drama, Art-house
Cardinal Richelieu and his power-hungry entourage seek to take control of seventeenth-century France, but need to destroy Father Grandier - the priest who runs the fortified town that prevents them from exerting total control. So they seek to destroy him by setting him up as a warlock in control of a devil-possessed nunnery, the mother superior of which is sexually obsessed by him. A mad witch-hunter is brought in to gather evidence against the priest, ready for the big trial.
IMDB
Viewed in the wake of the 11 September terrorist attacks, these religiously controversial scenes (which include a bawdy pantomime of priests fornicating with nuns; a lengthy interlude of naked nuns at leisure in their convent in the presence of a large dog; an extended sequence of Vanessa Redgrave's Sister Jeanne kissing and caressing Grandier's charred bone which she then uses - off screen - as a dildo; and two entire assemblies of the 'rape of Christ') were once again deemed unfit for public consumption. Despite offers by Lucida Productions to reinstate this material into The Devils at its own cost with the assistance of editor Mike Bradsell, the studio balked, declaring the "distasteful tonality" of the material to be entirely out of step with current company policy. Once again, the Americans who had initially financed Russell's outlandish vision decreed that the director had gone too far, and chose to censor their own property. It was only after much complex legal negotiation that Channel 4 was granted the right to exhibit this material at its own risk, and even as I write, mere weeks from our projected transmission date, I am aware that this right may yet be rescinded and those sequences may yet remain unseen.
Whether or not Russell's extraordinary vision would be enhanced by the reinstatement of this recovered material is clearly a matter of personal opinion. Having viewed an assembly of this sequence which Bradsell had brilliantly orchestrated with found fragments of Peter Maxwell Davies' electrifying score, Russell declared himself to be "delighted" with the results and enthusiastic about the sequence's imminent restoration. As things currently stand, however, there is little chance that the film's original backers will sanction such an act, though the possibility of sublicensing the material to an independent distributor remains an option. For the moment, though, Russell's beautiful monster must remain where it has always been: caged within the confines of state and studio censorship, cast out of the catholic canon of mainstream cinema.
(click to enlarge)
Ken Russell's Film of The Devils (1971)
Extras includes (on English):
- 'Hell on Earth' Documentary (50:06)
- Year of Censorship (04:48)
- UK Censors (01:10)
- James Ferman Interview (03:23)
- US Trailer (00:52)
The Devils (1971) [2-disc Special Edition] is here
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