Details

Release year: 2015

Storyline

A detective and a psychoanalyst uncover evidence of a satanic cult while investigating a young woman's terrifying past.

Top credits

Directors

Alejandro Amenábar

Writers

Alejandro Amenábar

Cast

Ethan Hawke — Bruce Kenner
David Thewlis — Kenneth Raines
Emma Watson — Angela Gray
Dale Dickey — Rose Gray

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Did you know

• Emma Watson insisted on not being in the rape scene at all, even for simple close-ups on her face. She wanted people to be able to tell without any hesitation that it was a body double and not her that was naked. This is why the hooded girl's face was digitally blurred and her naked body was only shot from behind.

• "Satanic Panic" is the name of the cultural obsession with "Satanic Ritual Abuse" which originated in the United States in the 1980s with the now-discredited memoir-style book "Michelle Remembers," written by Canadians Michelle Smith and her husband, psychiatrist Lawrence Pazder. The authors made waves during the 80's by traveling the talk-show circuit and testifying as expert witnesses in criminal trials alleging Satanic abuse. The book and Smith are represented in the film as "In Satan's Name" by S. Cooper, who is shown as a TV interview subject whose face is obscured in shadow to hide her identity.

• When Ethan Hawke dozes off in his recliner, right before the nightmare sequence, when the black mass takes place, there is a poker by the fireplace, but when he awakens, the poker is gone. This insinuates that in fact, it was not a dream, but that the mass did in fact take place. However, the entire point of the movie, is that it had to have been. And when he is in his bed and wakes from the dream, the telephone is off the hook, so it has to have happened.