True, it might have helped feed the frenzy of anti-Wiccan, look behind every repressed childhood memory for pentagrams and blood chalices evidence in numerous '80s court cases, but as cinema, it is a very powerful, scary flick. One can only empathize with what the parents, played by Helen Shaver and Martin Sheen, go through, in the course of the movie. Both are highly convincing in their parts and the script doesn't venture into the banal or the ridiculous, so we the audience are caught up in their dilemma. They are powerless over the forces of darkness, and it is that feeling of hopelessness and dread, which really digs deep into the viewer's psyche, particularly if one is a parent, him/herself.

It's an acuumulative "you are there," "imagine yourself in their shoes" experiment in terror. The result is one of the best horror films of the decade.

To give away anything in the way of plot would be a huge disservice to potential viewers. Suffice it to say that the acting is uniformly excellent. You're in the hands of a director who knows how and when to build suspense. At no point do you have to strain to willingly suspend disbelief. Shades of "Rosemary's Baby," but no wholesale lifting. Certainly a lot more believable than "Eyes Wide Shut" in the Devil Worshipping scenes. Belongs in every horror afficianado's collection.

BEK

It's like that saying, sometimes real life is scarier than fiction. Although, this is not one of those "based on a true story" type of movie, this movie was true to life in a lot of ways. Its' content reflected upon 2 very old religions that are very much alive and well in the U.S. and other parts of the world today.

Never underestimate the power of mind and intention (for good or bad) or the power of the universe.