The Possession of Michael King is a 2014 American found footagehorror film written and directed by David Jung, in his directorial debut, from a story by himself and Tedi Sarafian. The film had its world premiere on August 14, 2014 in Singapore and had a limited theatrical release in the United States on August 22 of the same year. It was released on to video on demand on August 26, 2014.[2] It stars Shane Johnson as a widowed, atheist filmmaker who finds himself the target of demonic forces.[3]
Documentary-maker Michael King does not believe in God, the devil, or any other supernatural existence. His wife Samantha believed the opposite. For many years, she visited medium Beverly for spiritual assistance. In a confrontation with Beverly, Michael tells her that his wife was killed in an accident after taking Beverly’s advice to stay home for her career instead of traveling with Michael. Beverly at first attempts to console Michael upon learning of his wife Samantha's death, but when Michael asks Beverly to admit she’s a fake medium, Beverly doesn't address his concern and instead asks him to leave.
Michael struggles to pick up his life again after the death of Samantha, having his sister Beth help care for his daughter, Ellie. He decides to make a documentary to prove that there is no afterlife, in which he offers himself as a test subject for the darkest supernatural rituals people believe. He places an advertisement on the internet where people can respond with suggestions for experiments to prove the opposite of his position. Michael decides that if he is wrong, at least he will become the first person with concrete evidence for the supernatural.
The first of Michael's internet contacts to visit him is a spiritual named Gibbons, whose sexually abusive father died of a heart attack shortly after he prayed to Satan for help, which Michael calls coincidence. Michael orders things online with which he could attempt to call demons, but nothing happens. Then he visits self-proclaimed demonologist Augustine and his wife Marsha. They give him LSD, bind him to a cross in their cellar, and chant spells onto him. Michael trips, but demons do not appear, and Augustine and Marsha use the opportunity to have sex with each other in his and his cameraman Jordan’s presence.
Michael contacts a funeral director who claims to be a necromancer. He dehydrates Michael with the substance "DMT" from the body of a toad (although not specified, this would be 5-MeO-DMT), which causes psychedelic experiences. Then he takes Michael to a cemetery at night, where he wants to transfer the spirit of a newly deceased person into his body. Before they are able to complete the ritual, police arrive. They run, and Jordan finds Michael under a trance, later claiming to have seen and felt Samantha.
Michael and Jordan attend a group meeting with a medium, who tries to give a message directly to Michael but has a seizure. At home, Michael begins suffering from a constant sound inside his head. He goes to a psychologist, who tries to get rid of the sound with hypnotherapy. The session is interrupted because lights in the room fail, and Michael moves feverishly around and shouts. Jordan analyzes the camera recording and determines that human vocal chords are not capable of producing those shouts. Michael suspects it’s a camera defect but Jordan leaves the documentary. Michael takes the camera to film himself. Without knowing it, he walks around at night, in one instance feeling Beth while she sleeps.
The sound in Michael's head begins to appear more often, and is like a talking voice. He becomes convinced that something dangerous is happening to him. He looks for the funeral owner to ask for help but he pushes him away. At night he unwittingly goes into Ellie's bedroom with a kitchen knife. The next day, Beth finds their dog, Fishbone, dead in Ellie's bed.
Michael sends Beth and Ellie away to stay with friends. Because the church refuses to do an exorcism, he tries to do it at home on his own. A Bible he holds goes up in flames and the entity in possession of his body makes him carve a pentagram on his torso. When he sews his injuries the next day, he notices that it hardly hurts to insert a needle into his thumb. The voice in his head demands that Michael kill Ellie. He refuses and goes after random people instead, unable to control himself. Michael decides to chain himself with handcuffs to his bed. He wakes the next morning to find the living room trashed. The walls are full of signs written in blood in Latin.
The next night, Michael handcuffs himself to his bed again while the demons torture him for not being able to make him harm anyone else. In the morning he finds his hand un-cuffed and bloodied. He finds a recording of the events the night before play on TV. He sees that Jordan came by, finding Michael in bed, and releases him to seek help. As the recording distorts, Michael finds Jordan dead, hanging from the ceiling.
Michael tries to kill himself, but every time, the entity stops him. Later, he watches a recording of Samantha, speaking from a hospital bed after the accident. She talks about meeting with angels and God and tries to convince Michael to not be worried for her. Michael talks to himself and his inner demon about the sounds inside his head, which were actually the sounds of angels trying to cover up the demon's voice, which he can now hear clearly. As he sits in a rocking chair at the front door, the voice in his head tells him: "We're together now, Michael."
In the morning, Beth comes home with Ellie. Michael kills Beth. Then he heads to Ellie, struggling with the demon to stop himself from hurting her. Michael begs Samantha for help. His wife's coin spins; looking into the mirror, he gets momentary control over himself, and uses the opportunity to throw himself out the window. He falls and dies while hearing Samantha's voice telling him "Everything will be all right now".
Epilogue (flashback)
On a sunny day, Michael and Samantha are with Ellie and Fishbone in the park. Because the time on the parking meter expired, he gives his wife a coin to put in the meter. She drops it in the road, and while picking it up, a car hits and fatally injures her.
For the film, Jung drew inspiration from the character of Jack Torrance from the 1980 film The Shining.[4] He noticed that The Shining and similar films that dealt with demonic possession did not tell the story from the viewpoint of the possessed person, and thought that it would be interesting to shift the film's view point to the possessed person.[5] Jung chose to make the film found footage as it would allow the character of Michael to document the events as they occurred, in a "scientific approach and personal approach and documentarian approach".[5] While researching for the film Jung "tracked down a lot of really arcane, occult manuscripts", some of which required translation, and also researched rituals that were passed down through oral traditions.[5] In an interview with Nerdist, Jung stressed that he did not want to use rituals that were like "a lot of the other stuff that had been explored in the recent mythology", as he wanted to avoid "Ouija boards and candle lighting" as the film's sole staple of demonic rituals.[5]
Johnson commented on his role, stating that he spent several months to prepare for the film where he viewed similar films to see "what works and what doesn't work" as he felt that "there's a lot of what doesn't work out there".[6] He also researched demonology and necromancy along with viewing films such as The Last Exorcism, which he said made him feel like he "came into the project with some ammunition".[6]
Reception
On Rotten Tomatoes the film has an approval rating of 32% based on reviews from 19 critics.[7] On Metacritic it has a score of and 34 out of 100 based on reviews from 10 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews".[8] Many film critics criticized the movie for being too overly familiar in how it delivered scares, its found footage aspect, and in its storyline.[9][10][11][12] Brian Tallerico for RogerEbert.com panned the film overall, writing "What's so depressing about fare like this is how creatively uninspired it feels to see the same tricks pulled over and over again. Horror—true fear—only comes from the unknown, the unexpected, the unexplained. There’s never a moment in “The Possession of Michael King” that isn’t telegraphed either by the film itself or from memories of a superior one. It is a work that mistakes loud for scary and turns to camera tricks just to keep you awake."[13]Twitch Film commented on the movie's familiarity and stated that "While Jung does not necessarily do anything new under the Sun with his jump scares, they are still effective in their execution."[14] Matt Donato of We Got This Covered also gave The Possession of Michael King a positive review, stating that he had not expected to enjoy the film as much as he had and singled out Johnson's performance as a highlight.[15]
Reviews from horror websites were more positive. Ain't It Cool News Horror praised Johnson's performance while Shock Till You Drop stated that Jung "gets the most out of the story and his talent".[16][17] Reviewers for Dread Central were split—one praised the film for its twists while the other criticized it for having too many "cheap scares and found footage tropes".[18][19]
Exorcism is the religious or spiritual practice of evicting demons, jinns, or other malevolent spiritual entities from a person, or an area, that is believed to be possessed. Depending on the spiritual beliefs of the exorcist, this may be done by causing the entity to swear an oath, performing an elaborate ritual, or simply by commanding it to depart in the name of a higher power. The practice is ancient and part of the belief system of many cultures and religions.
Pet Sematary is a 1989 American supernatural horror film and the first adaptation of Stephen King's 1983 novel of the same name. Directed by Mary Lambert, with King writing the screenplay, it stars Dale Midkiff, Denise Crosby, Blaze Berdahl, Fred Gwynne, and Miko Hughes as Gage Creed. The title is a sensational spelling of "pet cemetery".
Mirrors is a 2008 American supernatural horror film directed by Alexandre Aja, starring Kiefer Sutherland, Paula Patton, and Amy Smart. The film was first titled Into the Mirror, but the name was later changed to Mirrors. Filming began on May 1, 2007, and it was released in American theaters on August 15, 2008.
The Rite is a 2011 supernatural horror film directed by Mikael Håfström and written by Michael Petroni. It is loosely based on Matt Baglio's book The Rite: The Making of a Modern Exorcist, which itself is based on actual events as witnessed and recounted by American then-exorcist-in-training Father Gary Thomas and his experiences of being sent to Rome to be trained and work daily with veteran clergy of the practice.
V/H/S/2 is a 2013 found footage horror anthology film produced by Bloody Disgusting and Roxanne Benjamin. The sequel to V/H/S (2012) and the second installment in the V/H/S franchise, it comprises four found footage segments linked together by a fifth frame narrative. The film features a largely different group of directors: Jason Eisener, Gareth Wuw Evans, Timo Tjahjanto, Eduardo Sánchez, and Gregg Hale, and franchise returnees Simon Barrett and Adam Wingard.
Haunt is a 2013 American supernatural horror film directed by Mac Carter in his feature film directorial debut. The film premiered at the Film Society of Lincoln Center on November 6, 2013, and was later released on video on demand on February 7, 2014. Haunt stars Harrison Gilbertson as a teenager who moves into a new house and goes through not only a sexual awakening but also a terrifying haunting.
V/H/S: Viral is a 2014 American found footage horror anthology film produced by Bloody Disgusting, The Collective, Haxan Films, and Divide/Conquer. The sequel to V/H/S/2 (2013), it is the third installment in the V/H/S franchise and features three found footage segments linked together by a fourth frame narrative written and directed by Nacho Vigalondo, Marcel Sarmiento, Gregg Bishop, Justin Benson and Aaron Scott Moorhead. An additional segment was filmed, written and directed by Todd Lincoln, but was cut since it did not fit with the overall theme of the film.
Sx_Tape is a 2013 American found-footage horror film directed, edited, and photographed by Bernard Rose. The film premiered on October 10, 2013 at the BFI London Film Festival and released to DVD on July 2, 2014. It stars Caitlyn Folley and Ian Duncan as a young couple that decides to film a sex tape in an abandoned hospital, only to discover that it is not as abandoned as they believed it to be. The film has had a predominantly negative critical reception.
Ralph Sarchie is a retired NYPD sergeant and traditionalist Catholic demonologist. He has written a book, Beware the Night, which details many of his paranormal investigations; his accounts were later the basis of the film Deliver Us from Evil. Sarchie, in 2016, was featured in the film Hostage to the Devil, which detailed the life of Malachi Martin.
Inner Demons is a 2014 found footage horror film that was directed by Seth Grossman. The movie had its world premiere on 13 June 2014 at the Los Angeles Film Festival and stars Lara Vosburgh as a teenage drug addict whose problems may be a result of demonic possession.
The Taking of Deborah Logan is a 2014 American found footage supernatural horror film, which serves as the feature film directorial debut of Adam Robitel, who co-wrote the screenplay and edited the film with Gavin Heffernan. The film stars Jill Larson, Anne Ramsay and Michelle Ang. Set in Virginia, it tells the story of a documentary crew making a film about Alzheimer's patients who uncover something sinister while documenting a woman who has the disease. The film was produced by Jeff Rice and Bryan Singer and was released on October 21, 2014.
The Forbidden Girl is a 2013 German horror film that was directed by Till Hastreiter. The film was released in Germany on 7 February 2013 and was released to video in the United States on 26 August 2014. It stars Peter Gadiot as a young man that finds himself fascinated by a woman who seems to be the mirror image of his former sweetheart, who was carted off by a demon six years ago.
The Possession of Hannah Grace is a 2018 American supernatural horror thriller film directed by Diederik van Rooijen and written by Brian Sieve. It stars Shay Mitchell, Kirby Johnson, Stana Katic, Grey Damon and Nick Thune, and follows a former policewoman who encounters the supernatural while working in a morgue.
Little Evil is a 2017 American supernatural horror comedy film written and directed by Eli Craig. It stars Adam Scott, Evangeline Lilly, Owen Atlas, Bridget Everett, Kyle Bornheimer, Chris D'Elia, Donald Faison, Carla Gallo, Tyler Labine, Brad Williams, Clancy Brown, and Sally Field. It was released by Netflix on September 1, 2017.
Satanic Panic is a 2019 American comedy horror film directed by Chelsea Stardust, based on a screenplay written by novelist Grady Hendrix and adapted from a story created by Hendrix and Ted Geoghegan. It is a Fangoria production.
The Exorcism is a 2024 American supernatural horror film starring Russell Crowe as Anthony Miller, an actor whose deteriorating mental state on a horror movie set causes his daughter Lee to suspect either his former addictions or a more sinister cause. It is directed by Joshua John Miller, from a script he co-wrote with M. A. Fortin. The film also stars Sam Worthington, Chloe Bailey, Adam Goldberg, Adrian Pasdar, and David Hyde Pierce.
The Monster Project is a 2017 American horror film directed by Victor Mathieu and starring Justin Bruening and Toby Hemingway.
Faith is a survival horror video game developed by Airdorf Games for Windows. The game consists of three chapters; the first two were self-published by Airdorf Games in October 2017 and February 2019 respectively, while the third was published by New Blood Interactive in October 2022 as part of Faith: The Unholy Trinity, a compilation of all three chapters with additional features. The game uses retro graphics similar to the graphics of an Apple II or Atari 2600.
Horror in the High Desert is a 2021 American found footage film written, produced, and directed by Dutch Marich, with the mix of also being a pseudo-documentary, about the mysterious disappearance of a hiker in the High Desert region of Nevada.
The Mortuary Assistant is a 2022 horror game developed by DarkStone Digital and published by DreadXP. Set in 1998 in a small town in Connecticut, players control a newly hired assistant at a haunted mortuary.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
