The Demon

In a village in southern Italy, Purificazione learns the man she loves is engaged to someone else. Rather than accept it she turns to the village's old beliefs: she works a curse, mixes spell with prayer, behaves strangely at night. The village reads this not as heartbreak but as possession. What follows is the priests' rite and, alongside it, the physical and sexual violence of the villagers. Brunello Rondi took his story from a real case of supposed possession, and Daliah Lavi met the actual woman before shooting. The film shows a countryside where Christianity and older superstition have grown into each other, and the demon here is not an entity but the name a community finds for punishing a woman. In one scene Lavi performs a walk with her body bent backwards; a decade later the same movement would become one of the most discussed images in The Exorcist. The film screened at Venice on 27 August 1963. Who it's for: Anyone interested in 1960s Italian cinema, religious horror, and narratives built on folklore. Who it's not for: The violence against the woman is shown directly and at length. The film does not endorse the possession, but it is heavy to watch.