RELI 188 Special Topics in Religion (Spring 2016)
SID# 864263 ; Dayna Kalleres, Instructor
The Devil in Film
From its earliest beginnings, film has proven a fertile medium for creative, innovative, and challenging expressions of the devil, demons and the idea of evil. Once America passed through the tumultuous period of the 1960s and early 1970s, however, specifically Christian demonic themes of exorcism/possession/the antichrist/temptation/sin coalesced in a cinematic trifecta: Rosemary’s Baby, The Exorcist, and The Omen. From this point on, we can trace a steep rise in the production and cultural consumption of demonically themed films. This course considers how diabolic/demonic films function as a critical discourse in response to contemporary socio-cultural, religious and political shifts in America; likewise, with the rising popularity of these films, we explore how these films participated in shaping perceptions of the devil and the notion of evil in American popular culture. [Return to Spring 2016 courselist]