Straight out of the hype station on the tails of The Conjuring 3, this "documentary" is occasionally less boring than the movie, but never more believable. With the movie, I had to try and remove my opinions on the Warrens and the paranormal and view it as a movie outside of the context of its "based on a true story" tagline. This time, we get interview clips from multiple sources, including a 2005 interview from Lorraine Warren and interviews from the star of the trial, his wife, a few police officers and journalists from around the town, and random "experts" in Demonology and other paranormal fields. This "documentary" focuses more on the original possession of David Glatzel and much less on the actual "Devil Made Me Do It" case. For a paranormal "documentary", they do a good job getting as many first hand accounts as possible and most of the reenactments are good. The issue is that there are exactly zero skepticism anywhere in the 90 minutes of this "documentary". We get a lot of people with a vested interest in the demonic elements, but never anyone saying "Wait a minute." There are some notable absences of people mentioned in the interviews and seen in the reenactments, namely David and his brother who have come out against the possession story. This "documentary" kind of tries to prove their case with the interviews (most of which are suspect at best) and a couple of minutes of an audio recording of David in a "possessed state". Firstly, it's a little weird that in the early 80's all we got was a terribly recorded audio track. Secondly, I'm not sure how they are translating what David is saying because it's all coming out as gibberish. I can understand what everyone else is saying, but I'm getting a strong EVP on Ghost Adventures vibe where we just interpret it to say whatever we want it to say. What we get is a loose narrative told by people who weren't present at any of the events with occasional bits from people who were. We keep going back to a priest that wasn't involved to learn what happened, as if they didn't already interview one of the allegedly possessed people and two people who saw the events, but sure, let's talk to the "Demonologist" who has zero first hand knowledge. Let's be honest though, how many of us watch paranormal shows as actual documentary pieces and not just elaborate horror. If I view this as fictional entertainment, it has a large lack of entertainment: it's not particularly scary, the story is underdeveloped, and the cast is unconvincing. Even if we just view it as a companion piece to The Conjuring 3, there isn't any new info other than the presence of David's brother and that no one in the real life case knew what the fuck they were doing. This "documentary" has them going against the Devil himself (who seems a little under powered in this story) who presents as a creepy old man during the day and a "beast" at night along with (I think) 24 demons, while the movie has a much more streamlined story. Is it wrong that I found The Conjuring 3 more realistic than Shock Docs: The Devil Made Me Do It?
Straight out of the hype station on the tails of The Conjuring 3, this "documentary" is occasionally less boring than the movie, but never more believable. With the movie, I had to try and remove my opinions on the Warrens and the paranormal and view it as a movie outside of the context of its "based on a true story" tagline. This time, we get interview clips from multiple sources, including a 2005 interview from Lorraine Warren and interviews from the star of the trial, his wife, a few police officers and journalists from around the town, and random "experts" in Demonology and other paranormal fields. This "documentary" focuses more on the original possession of David Glatzel and much less on the actual "Devil Made Me Do It" case. For a paranormal "documentary", they do a good job getting as many first hand accounts as possible and most of the reenactments are good. The issue is that there are exactly zero skepticism anywhere in the 90 minutes of this "documentary". We get a lot of people with a vested interest in the demonic elements, but never anyone saying "Wait a minute." There are some notable absences of people mentioned in the interviews and seen in the reenactments, namely David and his brother who have come out against the possession story. This "documentary" kind of tries to prove their case with the interviews (most of which are suspect at best) and a couple of minutes of an audio recording of David in a "possessed state". Firstly, it's a little weird that in the early 80's all we got was a terribly recorded audio track. Secondly, I'm not sure how they are translating what David is saying because it's all coming out as gibberish. I can understand what everyone else is saying, but I'm getting a strong EVP on Ghost Adventures vibe where we just interpret it to say whatever we want it to say. What we get is a loose narrative told by people who weren't present at any of the events with occasional bits from people who were. We keep going back to a priest that wasn't involved to learn what happened, as if they didn't already interview one of the allegedly possessed people and two people who saw the events, but sure, let's talk to the "Demonologist" who has zero first hand knowledge. Let's be honest though, how many of us watch paranormal shows as actual documentary pieces and not just elaborate horror. If I view this as fictional entertainment, it has a large lack of entertainment: it's not particularly scary, the story is underdeveloped, and the cast is unconvincing. Even if we just view it as a companion piece to The Conjuring 3, there isn't any new info other than the presence of David's brother and that no one in the real life case knew what the fuck they were doing. This "documentary" has them going against the Devil himself (who seems a little under powered in this story) who presents as a creepy old man during the day and a "beast" at night along with (I think) 24 demons, while the movie has a much more streamlined story. Is it wrong that I found The Conjuring 3 more realistic than Shock Docs: The Devil Made Me Do It?
