The exorcism and possession subgenre has been at a creative stall basically since its heyday in the 1970s. The panoply of genre tropes looks more or less the same as it did several decades ago: demons taking control of human bodies, rare excursions of altered voices and special effects, edgy priests, bypassing the slow and burdensome bureaucracies of the Catholic Church’s rite of exorcism to react quicker to urgent possessions, and themes of belief and sacrifice. These are the essentials. The genre’s high point coincided with the climax of liberal thought, and on the heels of the Civil Rights Movement and its emphasis on autonomy and liberty, and it has persisted long enough to discover new metaphors for the genre to wrap around — and then lose them all over again. It’s a genre in need of a makeover.
The Priests, the 2015 South Korean film directed by Jang Jae-hyun, changed things up by bringing in the Rosicrucian sect, a quasi-religious and esoteric theosophical movement somewhat akin to the Freemasons. They keep exorcism a Catholic ritual, at least mostly, but they serve it in a new and debatably heretical flavor. That film was successful enough for a spinoff, and writer-director Kwon Hyeok-jae was handed the keys to the newly minted franchise. Dark Nuns, the sequel that doesn’t require any prior knowledge of the franchise, freshens things up by centering two women instead of the usual masculine priests in their struggle to convince the church of the need (and urgency) for the exorcism of a young boy.
The overwhelming majority of all cinematic exorcisms reflects the real-world patriarchal quasi-monopoly on clerical life. Only men are given the power to restore life to a demon-free normality. Sister Giunia (Song Hye-kyo) and Sister Michaela (Jeon Yeo-been), both still cinematically young and beautiful, of course, defy the church and their immediate superiors until they are permitted officially to unofficially exorcise the persistent demon afflicting Hee-joon (Moon Woo-jin). The men above her do not believe Sister Giunia about the reality and necessity for exorcism, and instead view her as a black sheep in their diocese (surprisingly, the filmmakers do not make the easy #MeToo analogy). Their position within the church is at risk, and so too would be their ability to receive the sacraments (and thus their salvation). The film doesn’t care too much about heightening the stakes in this very religious way, though. Instead, Giunia receives a terminal uterine cancer diagnosis at the film’s beginning as a cheat code to this impudence, and the screenplay duly forgets about the cancer until the end.
Director Kwon and writers Kim Woo-jin and Oh Hyo-jin are all relative newcomers to major feature production. That makes the veteran cinematographer behind The Spy Gone North and Default, Choi Chan-min, an intelligent and safe addition to the crew. His work on the film is technically superb, and he always has a keen eye for how much color every part of the story calls for, even if he prefers the close-up a little too much. Another smart addition is editor Shin Min-kyung, one of the best-known women editors in Korea right now. She brings her seasoned skills from working on high-stress genre films like Assassination (2015), Memoir of a Murderer (2017), #Alive (2020), and Alienoid (2022) to the table and makes the most of a weak script as she balances between patient and pulsating edits. These two technicians have the difficult job of making the film’s demon threatening without it ever really manifesting in the way most of these films choose. Presumably, the lack of a demonic incarnation begins in the accounting department, but it nonetheless puts a lot of pressure on these key department leads to keep things frightening without the easy shortcut of onscreen demons. In the absence of any corporeal demons onscreen, Choi’s photography is particularly important in creating an atmosphere where the viewers never doubt their existence, or question Giunia’s sanity in the way some of the characters do.
The theology of Dark Nuns stands apart from the usually strong Christological theologies that the exorcism genre has stood on for decades. The nuns here are still Christian even if they are not as Christocentric as the clerical men usually running these things, but when their prayers and Catholic exorcisms don’t work (and when the church creates additional obstacles), they aren’t afraid to make their work extra-ecclesial. Sometimes that means seeking the help of shamans. (Jang, who directed the first film, also went on to direct 2024’s widely acclaimed shaman-exorcist film Exhuma, though that likely came out too close to this to be an influence); at other times, that means with the help of Rosicrucian methods, an esoteric theosophy movement that has historically been at odds with the Catholic magisterium. They seek out the Gospel of Peter to aid their exorcism, and their secret knowledge of the supernatural world — obtained through experience and not through the usual avenues — proves integral to their anti-demon work. (One of the two can even smell evil in possessed bodies.) Dark Nuns is about as gnostic as cinematic exorcisms get: the reality of a secret world and secret knowledge and esoteric secret texts motivates Kwon’s idea of religious meaning.
This gnostic undercurrent works best in relation to the film’s most subversive characteristic: women exorcists. The wheel spins the same way it always has, only this time the gender of the religious members stretches out the hindrances until they can’t be stretched anymore. The additional obstacle is quite a big one because although the Catholic Church does recognize that anyone can, on occasion, cast out demons, only an ordained priest may technically perform the rite of exorcism. The subversive parallels between the periphery methods Giunia and Michaela employ and the subjugation of their experiences as women in a patriarchal church leave much to be desired. The screenplay doesn’t meaningfully explore the power undergirding both the standard exorcist protocol and their experiences as religious women in the church; instead, it sniffs out that the patriarchal power exists, makes the viewer aware of it, and dozes back off to a non-committal stance.
Kwon also sets up fantastic opportunities that he fails to take advantage of throughout. One huge shame is that the film washes away the gains it makes with the new gendered angle by making the two nuns ideologically void. They care about casting out the demons and only casting out the demons, and they are willing to use resources outside of the traditional church hierarchy and established exorcism rite to do so. No common link between any common power or even a more religiously-relativistic syncretic thread between shamanism, Catholicism, and Rosicrucianism (carried over from the first film) exists. There is no ideological center for the nuns that links their willingness to depart from the church. What beliefs guide them? Do they believe anything at all? Are they just empty receptacles for fighting the dark supernatural world? If the nuns are to fight against the darkness, if they are to fight against evil, it would be a lot more effective if they also had a vision for the Good.
DIRECTOR: Hyeok-jae Kwon; CAST: Song Hye-kyo Jeon Yeo-been Lee Jin-uk Moon Woo-jin; DISTRIBUTOR: Well Go USA; STREAMING: July 18; RUNTIME: 1 hr. 54 min.
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