Biyografi Dünyası
Les Démons

The Demons (Les Démons)

Movie · 1973 · 6 people

Spanish filmmaker Jesús Franco wrote and directed the horror film Les Démons (The Demons). It belongs to the nunsploitation strand, a corner of exploitation cinema built around convent settings, and genre listings place it under horror and sexploitation. A 1973 co-production between France, Portugal and Spain, it was shot in Spanish, with most of the filming done in Portugal. It travelled under several titles: Los demonios in Spanish and Die Nonnen von Clichy in German.

The story begins in the wake of a witch trial. The condemned woman declares that her daughters will avenge her one day, and the film's tension is built on that threat. Anne Libert plays Kathleen, Britt Nichols is Margaret and Doris Thomas is Anne Rosalinda, with Karin Field as Lady Winter, Howard Vernon as Lord Malcolm, Luis Barboo as Truro and Alberto Dalbés as Thomas Renfield. The Iranian actor Cihangir Gaffari appears as Lord Justice Jeffries, and Carmen Yazalde is also credited in the cast.

The film does not circulate in one definitive form. Several versions are known, and the running time ranges from 79 minutes up to 113 minutes for the longest surviving cut, so what a viewer sees depends on which print turns up.

DirectorJesús Franco

Reactions

You can pick up to 3 reactions.

Cast

Only cast members with a profile on this site are listed.

Cihangir Gaffari Actor · 86 years old Anne Libert Carmen Yazalde Howard Vernon Luis Barboo Doris Thomas

More from this director

Through different eyes

Cinephile Looks at script, editing and directing choices; keeps a distance from formula films.

The first problem with assessing Les Démons is that there is no single film to assess. A gap of more than half an hour between a 79-minute print and a 113-minute one changes both the editing rhythm and the balance of the story, so any verdict depends on which version you happen to find. The dramatic spine is thin: the condemned woman's threat that her daughters will take revenge is almost the only engine of tension. In a subgenre like nunsploitation that engine usually serves as a pretext for provocative imagery, and in my view this film rarely moves beyond that pattern. A weak pick for anyone wanting a well-built horror story; genre historians should at least know which cut they are watching.

History & Society Lens Asks about the period, the social background and what the work reflects.

The witch trial points to a dark chapter of European history, a time when women were accused and condemned, and the revenge motif is set up as an answer to that injustice. Yet the film uses this historical material for the demands of its genre rather than to question anything; the very label nunsploitation says openly that convent life is being turned into exploitation fodder. So the film tells us less about the era it depicts than about its own decade, the 1970s: a production model in which French, Portuguese and Spanish partners joined forces and used religious institutions as a source of provocation. An interesting specimen for film historians; anyone after a period piece that makes you think about witch hunts may come away empty-handed.

Family Viewer Asks whether the whole household can watch it; cares about humour and heart.

This is not a family film, and it is worth saying so plainly. Genre listings file it under horror and sexploitation, so both fear and sexual content are in the foreground. It is not something to put on with children, teenagers or grandparents. It is strictly for adults who know what they are choosing. If it turns up on the shared screen by chance, switch to something else.

These are not reader reviews: they are short editorial takes written from different viewer perspectives with AI assistance. Reader reviews are below.

Reviews (0)

Log in Log in to write a review.

Comments