BOOK REVIEW: The Case Against Satan (Ray Russell)

Written in 1962 before the term "exorcist" was as ubiquitous as it is today, The Case Against Satan is the story of a Catholic priest tasked with saving a young girl who claims to be possessed by the Devil himself.

In much the same way that Peter Benchley's Jaws (and Steven Spielberg's movie) brought the potential danger of sharks into the paranoid consciousness of the general public, so Ray Russell's The Case Against Satan reopened the door for the almost-forgotten Catholic practice of exorcism to become a media phenomenon.

While Russell's book shares some similarities to William Peter Blatty's 1971 novel and 1973 screenplay of The Exorcist, the parity is largely from the set-up rather than the execution.

Young priest Father Gregory Sargent - who may have a drinking problem, but definitely embraces modern, scientific ideas - is moved to a new parish in the city, where one of his first encounters is with widower Robert Garth and his oddly-behaving teenage daughter, Susan.

After a lifetime as a "clean-talking sweet little girl", she has suddenly developed an aversion to churches, a penchant for foul language, and - on one occasion - stripping in front of a priest and violently sticking her nails into his throat.

Garth refuses to take his daughter to a psychiatrist, and so Fr Sargent, aided by his superior, Bishop Conrad Crimmings, try talking to the girl instead.

Eventually, they are led to believe she may be possessed and so Crimmings instructs Sargent to conduct an exorcism on her.

Clearly The Case Against Satan lays the groundwork for The Exorcist, but unlike that game-changing movie, it is far more cerebral and less cinematic in its approach.

That's not to say there aren't horrific descriptions of the restrained Susan's contortions and pleas as the holy men try to exorcise the "demon" from within her.

But here the dynamics are delivered through dialogue, as the priest and the Bishop discuss their different takes on the situation, while verbally jousting with the "demon" (if that's even what it is).

Along the way we are introduced to a number of side characters, who all have their own input on the scenario, ultimately creating a tone more akin to a hardboiled crime novel than an out-and-out horror story.

Coming in at 140-pages, this is an engaging - and fascinating - read, like discovering a story about an island under siege from a predatory shark before Benchley's bestseller saw print.

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A New UFO Film From Steven Spielberg? Yes, Please!

If you found out we weren’t alone, if someone showed you, proved it to you, would that frighten you? This summer, the truth belongs to seven billion people. We are coming close to … Disclosure Day.

Universal Pictures is proud to release a new original event film created and directed by Steven Spielberg. The film stars SAG winner and Oscar nominee Emily Blunt (Oppenheimer, A Quiet Place), Emmy and Golden Globe winner Josh O’Connor (Challengers, The Crown), Oscar winner Colin Firth (The King’s Speech, Kingsman franchise), Eve Hewson (Bad Sisters, The Perfect Couple) and two-time Oscar nominee Colman Domingo (Sing Sing, Rustin).

Based on a story by Spielberg, the screenplay is by David Koepp, whose previous work with Spielberg includes the scripts for Jurassic Park, The Lost World: Jurassic Park, War of the Worlds and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Combined, those films earned more than $3 billion worldwide. Koepp also wrote the script for this 2025’s Jurassic World Rebirth.

HALLOWEEN HORROR: Honeydew (2020)

 

Botany student Rylie (Malin Barr) and her waiter-cum-actor boyfriend Sam (Sawyer Spielberg, son of Steven Spielberg and Kate Capshaw) are travelling across New England, so she can research an outbreak of an ergot-like fungus called "sordico" that has been devastating local farms.

After their attempt to camp in a field is interrupted by the land owner in the middle of the night, they find their car won't start and so have to walk to the nearest property in the hopes of being able to call for assistance.

They turn up at the home of eccentric old farmer Karen (Barbara Kingsley), who lives in a rundown house with her brain-damaged son, Gunni (Jamie Bradley), who passes his time watching Popeye cartoons or staring at static on the TV.

Karen phones a neighbour to come over and help, but he never turns up and so the young couple are forced to share an awkward evening meal with Karen and Gunni, before the strange old lady shows them to a basement bedroom where they can pass the night.

Despite his medically-necessary dietary regime, Sam can't settle and so goes back upstairs to eat some more.

He is surprised by Gunni, who seems to be trying to tell him something, but then Sam passes out and has a Popeye-themed hallucination about his stomach condition.

Upon waking, he can't find Rylie - or Karen - and starts to search the house and its environs, but wandering into a barn he is ambushed and drugged.

Written and directed by Devereux Milburn, Honeydew is Texas Chain Saw Massacre family dynamics seen through a David Lynch or League of Gentlemen lens, with the extended sequence of Karen's hospitality to her guests being a marvellous, nerve-testing, exercise in the horror of the peculiar and uncomfortable.

Milburn clearly likes to push his audience as far as they can comfortably go, then push them a bit further.

No matter how bizarre the behaviour of the strange hostess - and her son - gets it feels so real and genuine, there is clearly something going on that the young guests aren't privy to.

While there is shock and gore in Honeydew, the best weapon in its arsenal is discomfort. 

From the start, this atmosphere is accentuated by unusual sound design and experimental split screen, which could be construed as affectation, but if you allow yourself to be drawn into this nightmare, it can be genuinely unnerving.

Having taken a reasonably cliché set-up - and some very on-the-nose foreshadowing of the cause of the madness ahead - the writer/director puts a impressively disturbing spin on things.

Even when you think the action has moved into more familiar captivity tropes, matters continue to unfold in dark, weird, perverse, and unexpected ways. 

For a moment, Devereux Milburn lulls you into thinking Honeydew might turn out to be standard Hollywood horror fare after all, but then he swiftly pulls the rug from under your feet.

But then the frights aren't over. 

The bleak denouement seems to go on and on (but in a good way), and the more you dwell on what is happening before your eyes the more it'll get under your skin.

Historian Rates Nine American Civil War Battles In Movies

Garry Adelman, a historian, rates nine American Civil War battles in movies.

He comments on the Civil War-era artillery and rifles on display in Free State of Jones (2016), starring Matthew McConaughey; and Emancipation (2022), starring Will Smith. 

He explains the use of dynamite and other explosives seen in Cold Mountain (2003), starring Jude Law, Nicole Kidman, and Renée Zellweger; Sahara (2005), starring Matthew McConaughey; and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1967), starring Clint Eastwood.

He breaks down the military strategy seen in the battle scenes in Glory (1989), starring Matthew Broderick, Morgan Freeman, and Denzel Washington; Gettysburg (1993), starring Jeff Daniels; and Steven Spielberg’s Lincoln (2012), starring Daniel Day-Lewis, Sally Field, and Tommy Lee Jones. 

And finally, he separates fact from fiction regarding Civil War-era surgeries as seen in Dances with Wolves (1990), starring Kevin Costner.

Adelman is the chief historian at the American Battlefield Trust. He has also been a licensed battlefield guide at Gettysburg National Military Park for 27 years.