Demonic (2021)

"Oh Neill, What Have You Done This Time?"

The new film from director Neill Blomkamp (DISTRICT 9, CHAPPIE and...er...ELYSIUM) gets a UK cinema and digital release, to be followed by Blu-ray and DVD, after premiering as the opening film at 2021's Frightfest film festival.

Carly (Carly Pope) is troubled by dreams of her mother Angela (Nathalie Boltt) who she hasn't seen for many years. She's contacted by Martin (Chris William Martin) who tells Carly that Angela is now in a coma. Carly visits her mother in hospital to be told the coma was due to a self-induced blow to the head, the latest in a series of self-mutilations her mother subjected herself to while in prison.

Despite being in a coma Angela is apparently able to communicate through a virtual reality program the hospital's research team has been developing. They encourage Carly to enter her mother's virtual space where she finds her mother may have been possessed by a crow-headed demon.

DEMONIC has a great central idea and a great monster. Unfortunately the film itself isn't executed very well at all, with uninvolving storytelling that leaves you with the odd sense that someone lost all the good footage and it had to be replaced by people sitting in armchairs talking about it instead. The concept of an army of Catholic priests kitted out like the NRA's version of GHOSTBUSTERS pops up at one point but it's too little too late. 

It's another career mis-step for Blomkamp who seems to be suffering from M Night Shyamalan's problem of being a one-hit wonder with the quite excellent DISTRICT 9 (2009) but who in the subsequent 12 years following that has failed to come up with anything worth shouting about. It's sad to report that DEMONIC feels very much like a first effort by someone with a couple of interesting ideas but little talent or expertise to carry them through. Frightfest has something of a tradition of their festival opening films being extremely variable in quality and it saddens me to report that Neill Blomkamp's DEMONIC is one of the crappy ones. Here's the trailer if you fancy a look:

Neill Blomkamp's DEMONIC is out in UK cinemas and on premium digital from Friday 27th August 2021 and on Blu-ray and DVD from Monday 25th October 2021