Let’s do a head count, how many possession films can you recall where a man or a boy gets possessed? Probably only a handful… Chances are the number of possessed men/boys in your head just doesn’t add up to much, while in turn, you could probably just as easily recall films where possessed women are titular characters.
Due to this, many critics and film theorists alike have “called out” possession films as agents of patriarchal point of view. Possession films rely on taking away a woman’s agency, presenting their bodies as vulnerable empty vessels that fall prey to sinister (often masculine) forces; on top of which a masculine figure, often agents of the church, would swoop in to right all wrongs. Acting out their agency on the woman akin to a demon possessor.
But then again, as society progresses with its uphill battle against the patriarchy, some possession films have challenged its reputation of presenting patriarchal gender dynamics. A paper by Ellena R. Sweet offers some insights as to how to identify these non-traditional possession films.
She does this by analyzing the two previously mentioned archetype characters of possession films: the possessed, and those who come to rid the possessions—in quintessential possession films The Exorcist and The Conjuring.
As a start, Sweet underlines that both films somewhat agree with each other by presenting a possessed woman/girl— they even agreeably present them as the only two things that patriarchy sees a woman can be, an innocent little girl (Regan from The Exorcist) or an attentive and faithful mother (Carolyn Perron from The Conjuring), as what happens in a woman’s life in between those two stages must never be spoken of in society.
Both are also portrayed to be vulnerable, their well-being depends on other characters. Again, this is the patriarchy in action. Regan depends on the presence of her working mother, Chris, and Carolyn depends on the presence of her working husband. The absence of their codependent halves causes them to fall into sadness and eventually depression, allowing supernatural entities to take over their bodies. Note how only Regan’s mother, a working mother, is in the picture when it comes to taking accountability for raising her.
Despite this, both Regan and Carolyn are portrayed to have differing degrees of agency over their bodies during exorcisms. Regan on the one hand, has no part to play in how she is cured, she is immediately subjected to painful acts without having any say in the matter. Carolyn, on the other hand, is instead portrayed to have the ultimate power to cure herself—her love for her daughters—a paradox, since they are also the source of her mental exhaustion. Still, in her own albeit flawed way, Carolyn has more agency over her possessed body than Regan does.
On the possession doctor’s corner, we have the expected male priest, Father Karras from The Exorcist, who finds his counterpart in Lorraine Warren, a working mother from The Conjuring. Citing Carol Clover, Sweet argues that the narrative of possession films is centred around these possession doctor’s arcs, they are the possessors, and they act with active agency. As for the possessed, they are often simply passive narrative devices that allow the possessor characters to develop.
The Exorcist’s Father Karras brings the now typical story of a man struggling with his faith, his encounter with Regan serves as a benchmark that allows him to fully commit to religious beliefs. As previously mentioned, this is often the essence of traditional possession films, where the plights of male priests are of utmost importance.
Instead, The Conjuring flips this representation by employing Lorraine Warren, a demonologist who works together with her husband Ed Warren whom the film recognises as “the only non-ordained person sanctioned by the Catholic Church to perform exorcisms.”
Despite her involvement with Ed, Lorraine is shown to take the lead in their endeavour. She uses her gifts of visions from the beyond to help people. She does this despite its poor effects on her health, and despite the double standards that working women encounter, forcing her to choose between working and homemaking.
The events of The Conjuring strengthened her, and in the end, it allowed her to choose to keep on working despite her struggles. Struggles that her husband Ed does not share despite them sharing a job and the burden of raising the same daughter.
And that is how Sweet concludes, that despite their best efforts, The Exorcist, still at the end of the day, mainly upholds patriarchal values, the archetype of oftly criticized possession films. And that The Conjuring presents itself as a more progressive alternative. In terms of how they’ve put Lorraine in a priest’s shoes and given Carolyn some degree of agency over her possessed body, blurring the line between the roles of the possessed and the possessor.
Using Sweet’s method, we can then discern other films that serve to further The Conjuring’s progressive tone. One obvious choice is Jennifer’s Body, often hailed for its feminist tone. The feminist genius of Jennifer’s Body though, runs deeper than the exchange “You are killing people!” “No, I’m killing boys.”
And so the infamous story goes… after a botched satanic sacrifice (due to her not being a virgin) by a fame-hungry indie band. Jennifer Check comes back to life not quite herself. She’s now possessed by a demonic entity, a succubus that primarily eats boys for a living. Her salvation? First and foremost, herself, with the help of her best friend, Anita “Needy” Lesnicki.
Jennifer is no Regan or Carolyn Perron, she does not adhere to patriarchal pressures and is portrayed to be sexually active, not afraid to speak her mind, and knows just how gorgeous she is while doing it all. After understanding that she needs to feed on human flesh, Jennifer fully retains her agency and decides to go with the flow, she is both possessed and possessor. Only after Needy rips their bff necklace from her neck, does she realize that she’s gone too far, allowing Needy to kill her.
Needy, the possession doctor, is also no Lorraine Warren, much less a Father Karras. After she puts two and puts two and two together about her best friend, Needy goes out and tries to find a way to help her all by herself. Because of course, who would believe a teenage girl on such a thing? A patriarchal society tends to take their word for the truth only when it benefits them.
Needy also doesn’t have an internal battle between science and faith or a wrestling match with society’s double standards. Her quarrel is with patriarchal forces that dictate how women should relate to each other, doomed for fallout as they are said to be catty and too hormonal to ever get along. And God forbid that they are lesbians who love one another!
But Needy loves her best friend as you would yours, no matter how many times she crosses the line. The story ends with her brutally murdering the band responsible for Jennifer’s possession with powers she got after being scratched by the demon that was inside Jennifer. Here also, the line between possessed and possessor is blurred.
To cap it all off, Needy’s need to contextualize Jennifer’s motives emphasizes the film’s overarching message as a possession film—that no one deserves what a patriarchal society puts them through, not the possessed, nor the possessors, or anyone in between. Even the boys that become Jennifer’s meal all have decent background stories that humanize them.
The most recent and hardest hit that a traditional possession film has taken comes from The Old Ways. Written by Marcos Gabriel, the film is set in Veracruz, Mexico and follows the plights of Mexican-American, Cristina Lopez. This already sets the film apart as most of the widely distributed possession films (by Hollywood standards) typically follow the plights of white women, with few exceptions gaining a wide international audience such as the blaxploitation film Abby, and South Korea’s The Wailing.
Cristina Lopez of The Old Ways becomes quite literally both possessed and possessor. The film begins with her being held against her will on account of possession by a group of people: the bruja (Hispanic term for witch) Luz, her son, and Cristina’s cousin, Miranda. The script plays out this state of “Is she possessed?” for as long as possible, throughout which she is fully livid and exercises her agency by trying to escape captivity multiple times. Only when she loses some of her memories and terrible things occur that only she could have done in her cell room, does she realize “Ok, something other than myself occupies my body”.
After this is revealed, Cristina works together with Luz against the demon (revealed to be a fictional Aztec God named Postheki). Cristina even encourages Luz to perform what appears to be the most painful yet effective form of exorcism in the books. Long story short, Postehki then exits Cristina, kills Luz, and enters Miranda, to which Cristina has to brave herself to take on the bruja mantle. The possessed becomes the possessor.
The connection shown to brujas, witches, also infers an interesting thought: are possessed women with agency simply witches, standing proudly in alliance with forces from beyond?
Either way, The Old Ways has flipped patterns that still can be seen in The Exorcist. Although Luz may perform the exorcisms, not much can be said of her as a character. Affirming that this is now the story of the possessed woman, the possession doctor, and the possessors, including Postehki, are merely there to help her character develop, from possessed to possessor.
Not only that, The Old Ways also problematizes how painful exorcisms are on those who are possessed. Questioning why the possessors have been so careless in acting out their agency. As if asking “Is pain necessary for salvation?” the now bruja Cristina chooses to not hurt Miranda, opting instead to talk to her much as Lorraine Warren did to Carolyn Perron. In the end, the entity was rid of through a team effort between Cristina and Miranda, it was their sense of sisterhood, the alliance between women, that prevailed. Showing that if you are privileged to hold power over another, choose compassion, choose to uplift them instead of crucifying them.
The Old Ways even touches upon the generational trauma shared between women. Cristina lost her mother to a possession, to which her distrust of “the old ways” stems. She grew up believing that what her mother needed was comprehensive healthcare, not a violent exorcism. After understanding that the supernatural world is indeed a very real one, she then seeks to modify exorcisms, opting for less painful alternatives that Regan from The Exorcist might just prefer.
At the end of the day, The Old Ways pushes the boundaries of a possession film’s narrative and proves that it is indeed possible to make one that doesn’t succumb to patriarchal ways.
