‘Devils Stay’ Review: New Korean Horror Stays Firmly in the Religious Horror Lane
While it may have seemed subtle at first, I anticipate Arkasha Stevenson’s The First Omen will have a lasting, lingering impact on the broader spectrum of religious horror. Not only was the film a fantastic prequel, subverting legacy franchise filmmaking expectations, but it was also one of the few contemporary religious horror films with something to say beyond, “Hey, aren’t demons kind of scary?” In a post-The-First-Omen world, Hyun Moon-Seop’s Devils Stay lands with more of a whimper than a frenetic, devilish bang. Stylish and commanding, Devils Stay is still constrained by the subgenre’s expectations. Entertaining as he might be, you’ve no doubt seen this devil before.
Cha Seung-Do’s (Park Shin-Yang’s) daughter, a recent heart transplant recipient, dies of cardiac arrest during an exorcism. Devils Stay opens mid-exorcism, a kind of truncated introduction akin to The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It, only without the latter’s scale and gravitas. There are flickering lights, distorted voices, and then a tragic death. Lee Min-Ki’s Priest Van isn’t convinced the demon possessing the deceased So-mi (Lee Re), is gone. But in typical horror movie fashion, no one is willing to believe him until it’s too late.
Seung-Do as the bereaved father is in a state of flux, orchestrating the unconventional one-day funeral while retaining hope that it’s all been a huge mistake, that is his daughter is still alive. Well, turns out demons can, in fact, remain in the bodies of the deceased and retain their requisite, ghoulish charm. I’m talking insects in the mouth, flickering lights, that “did that body just move” sense of tension and uncertainty.
Hyun Moon-Seop channels it all with a frenzied, distinctly South Korean genre movie approach. Even amidst the familiarity, Devils Stay is energetic and gross enough to captivate. At times, Devils Stay is a more impatient The Autopsy of Jane Doe—consider it The Autopsy of So-mi. Hyun Moon-Seop pretty quickly skates past the slow build-up to arrive at the reverberations of the possession, a force that threatens every person in attendance, school friend and morgue worker alike.
Bodies levitate, priests shatter their skulls on tabernacles, and just as it appears the devils of Devils Stay threaten to overstay its welcome, Hyun Moon-Seop adds a heap of cult horror and Russian Orthodox Church lore for some final zest, rendering the world of Devils Stay bigger than expected. It’s the kind of scale and commitment to trashy genre thrills this summer’s The Exorcism lacked. Even as the film treads familiar ground, the sheer delight in outrageous possession antics keeps Devils Stay afloat.
Yet, as noted before, religious horror films—even the tawdriest among them—have a pretty high bar to clear now that The First Omen exists. Not every movie needs something profound to say, but possession horror wore out its welcome quicker than most. Try to think of any possession movie since 1973 that’s had something meaningful to say. The Wailing and Thai-South Korean offering The Medium certainly did, but those kinds of exceptional titles are few and far between. Devils Stay lands somewhere closer to another Russell Crowe exorcism flick, namely The Pope’s Exorcist. What it lacks in thematic depth it more than makes up for with a zealotry for horror excess.
Devils Stay is pretty gnarly. Hyun Moon-Seop crafts a bloody, energized world replete with hot priests and scary, possessed young girls. Familiarity holds it back, the equivalent of horror movie junk food. It’s not good for you, but it’s a stylishly filmed, sufficiently energized possession shocker. Come for the South Korean thrills, stay for the legions of moths. Just don’t expect it to really grab hold.
Devils Stay arrives in theaters on December 6, 2024.
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Devils Stay
Summary
Devils Stay is a gnarly, pulsating possession yarn that bears the weight of familiarity.
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