The Devils

Ken Russell’s camp-horror psychodrama, a riff on the Huxley chronicle The Devils of Loudun and John Whiting’s play of the same, found its crucial production designer in Jarman, on a breakthrough commission that would change his life’s direction. While Russell’s "possessed" nuns under Redgrave’s tutelage face the wrath of inquisitor Reed, Jarman’s astonishing expressionist sets constantly command the eye and remain its greatest legacy, a performer in their own right: brooding, threatening and urgent.