Late Night Classics – The Devonsville Terror

I really am a glass is half full kind of guy. I look past director’s not-so amazing films and concentrate on when they were on fire and hitting their marks. Filmmaker Ulli Lommel was rocking and rolling in the 80′s with one diverse horror movie after another. There is nothing more exciting for me than introducing an obscure flick to a new audience. Ulli Lommel granted me a rare interview on The Devonsville Terror, a tale of witchcraft, which was quite daring at the time considering American audiences were in the midst of a slasher craze.

Jason Bene: Within the horror community you are best known for your 1980 film The Boogeyman. I have always had a soft spot for The Devonsville Terror and respected the fact that you were making something fresh and original. What made you decide to do a modern day witchcraft movie?

Ulli Lommel: I had spent some time in Salem, MA and was drawn into the 17th century witch hunt. I stayed about a month to research and decided it was important to tell the story from the POV of the three persecuted women and to also ultimately show a woman who refuses to accept the same witch hunt all over again 300 years later. During my research I had hoped to find clues that the Catholic church was the main perpetrator during the time of the inquisition, but to my dismay I came across writings by the so called reformer Martin Luther, who said about women: “They are only good for giving birth to babies, then they should all be killed.” Plus, all of Germany – under Luther – was up in smoke, because he burnt them by the thousands on the stake.

Jason Bene: I have always been intrigued by reincarnation. There is something unsettling about the possibility that you live on in another life in another time. What are your personal beliefs on the subject?

Ulli Lommel: When you meet someone “by chance”and you both have that strange feeling of being familiar with each other and you instantly trust each other and care for each other, where does all that come from? It’s a mystery of course, but maybe you already know each other from a previous experience which was a good one? The same applies to strangers you meet and hate them instantly or have some kind of negative feeling. The soul exists before and after, in that I believe strongly. Our soul doesn’t just die. It leaves our bodies at death just like we leave a car (and maybe get into another
car).

Jason Bene: You and your former wife, Susanna Love, made a great team on the pictures Brainwaves and Olivia. I think she shined the brightest in her performance here as Jenny Scanlon. She is an empowered woman and that bothers the male-dominated town fathers. The Devonsville Terror is the complete opposite of The Wicker Man remake where women where being slapped around left and right. Did you make a point to make your female characters strong and independent?

Ulli Lommel: I always had a more intimate relationship to women, and by that I mean matters regarding the heart and soul. Most of my friends are female or transsexual. I love transsexuals. They have a very fine tuned and very special quality. Men I usually don’t care for too much, except for homosexuals. They are more sensitive, imaginative and funny. Real men are often much to ego driven and stupid. And then there are these career women who want to be even more dominating and nasty then men, and I can’t stand them either, that’s the worst. I think a good man or good woman has an even yin and yang, that’s the best.

Jason Bene: Donald Pleasence is one of my all-time favorite actors who has done a few horror films in his time. What was it like working with a legend like
him?

Ulli Lommel: Donald Pleasence was like an angel, sweet and sensitive and so talented and loving and giving, it was such a joy to work with him. A year later I made a film with Klaus Kinski and he was the worst, a complete maniac, an idiot and asshole. Sure he was gifted, but working with him was a nightmare. Besides Donald Pleasence I loved working with Tony Curtis, Keir Dullea, Vera Miles, Robert Walker and of course Andy Warhol, with whom I made 2 films with (Blank Generation and Cocaine Cowboys).

Jason Bene: The gory ending closely mirrored the finale of Raiders of the Lost Ark with the exploding and melting heads. I love that kind of stuff! Was it your choice to have them in there, or was that the distributor’s decision?

Ulli Lommel: I could’ve done without that, but the sales people insisted on it. I would’ve preferred to stick to pure drama. And, yes, it was in reference to Raiders, I guess that’s obvious, even though I do not like the scene where Harrison Ford just kills this Arab guy, that scene is typical Spielberg fascism. But he redeemed himself in my eyes by allowing the Nazi in his holocaust film to be a highly complex character. Spielberg, like Eastwood, seems to have had a few revelations and his consciousness widened, which is nice to experience, especially in Eastwood’s case.

Jason Bene: Did The Devonsville Terror receive a theatrical release in 1983?

Ulli Lommel: No, it went straight to cable and then home video. But it received nice reviews world-wide and it still is one of my favorite films.

Here’s my list of Top 10 Ulli Lommel films, if I may: 1. Tenderness of the Wolves. 2. Adolf & Marlene. 3. Blank Generation 4. Cocaine Cowboys. 5. Second Spring 6. Devonsville Terror 7. Olivia 8. Brainwaves 9. Strangers in Paradise. 10. Boogeyman.