The Devil Inside

The first, and probably last, low budget found-footage exorcism movie to share its name with a No. 2 INXS hit, this faux documentary tracks the attempt of a young woman named Isabella (Fernanda Andrade) to help her possessed mother (Suzan Crowley). In 1989, Mom slaughtered three people who were conducting an exorcism on her (pity the fool who tried to write that year’s round-robin family Christmas letter!) and is now languishing in a psychiatric hospital in Rome. With the Catholic church unwilling to help, Isabella recruits two renegade exorcists (Simon Quarterman, Evan Helmuth) to take on her mother’s quite literal demons, while an increasingly creeped-out documentarian (Ionut Grama) captures the ensuing mayhem with his cameras.

Alas, the mayhem doesn’t ensue for all that long. While this religio-horror effort does contain some nice scares, and a memorably unnerving turn from Crowley, The Devil Inside‘s biggest shock arrives when it abruptly ends — just as it hits its stride. The result is a found-footage movie whose third act remains missing. C+