Expelling Evil With Diet Cola

Word up to your religious beliefs: the 1973 French made (French maid – heh) Expulsion of the Devil (aka, At the Meeting with Joyous Death or Au rendez-vous de la mort joyeuse) does NOT show the Devil. The movie implies Sophie, a morose 14 year-old daughter (part of the equation of mom, dad, younger brother), is possessed by said evil and is responsible for windows breaking on their own and furniture being tossed around as if hucked by professional wrestlers. But not cursing, bleeding or vomiting, all things Devil associated.

The above family lives in a French countryside Inn so huge, you could have your own personal wine cellar. (France folk drink wine like diet cola, hence the reference.) Without any build-up or warning, windows start breaking inward, leaving a carpet of sharp glass to playfully roll around on. Later, while attempting to drink some diet cola, the table, chairs and other chunks of furniture hurl chaotically (something I do after attempting to drink wine), crashing and breaking everything.

Then a friend comes over for dinner and some refreshing AND relaxing diet cola. The kitchen doesn’t like him and tries to crush him with the fridge and oven. Then it throws him out the only window left unbroken.

A friend of the family’s dad has a TV show that airs weird stuff like this. The family temporarily moves out and a small crew moves in to film all the weird stuff. Well hey — nothing’s happening…until Sophie returns.

Things that make no sense at all: A preacher showing up at night with seven very young girls, looking to crash for the night. Then a TV crew guy gets his hand burned by super hot diet cola. Then the head TV guy wakes up screaming, covered in some sort of lumpy brown stuff. (I don’t attend church, but I prayed that was just mud.) Then he crashes through the floor into a well so deep, you can’t even hear him splash/splat.

The only thing remotely considered evil is when Sophie takes off her shirt/smock in front of the mirror and the reflection doesn’t quite reflect everything she’s doing. With that out of the way, everybody abandons ship, leaving an suspiciously smiling Sophie to stare at the house. That’s it in an evil nutshell.

And while this sounds the the business model of 1979’s The Amityville Horror (or L’horreur d’Amityville), Expulsion of the Devil seems more like puberty gone amok than some satanic box social with self rearranging furniture, cursing, vomiting and diet cola.