Neill Blomkamp Gets Supernatural with 'Demonic'

By Nate Parker | Film | July 21, 2021 |

By Nate Parker | Film | July 21, 2021 |

Does anyone else remember The Cell? The turn of the century movie had Jennifer Lopez as a sexy social worker invading the mind of a comatose egg-looking serial killer, played by Vincent D’Onofrio, so she can find out where he hid his latest kidnap victim. Its increasingly bonkers set pieces and costumes look like a bad acid trip and it makes very little sense, so I love it. It’s the first thing I thought of when I saw the synopsis for Demonic, the newest film written and directed by Neill Blomkamp. In it, a young woman is given the opportunity to connect with her comatose, estranged, mass-murdering mother via an experimental VR procedure developed by Therapol, a medical science corporation that I’m sure in no way turns out to be evil.

Y’know, I was in until the Vatican’s S.W.A.T. team showed up and it turned into a Jonathan Maberry novel. You might as well name the demon Nicodemus. And why hasn’t Maberry’s Joe Ledger series been developed for television yet?? They did V-Wars instead which was… mediocre. Still, you’ve got blood, gore, dark hallways, demonic possession, firefights against supernatural beings, and family drama, so I’ll give it a shot. I almost feel envious of our unnamed protagonist. My mother’s an adept emotional manipulator delivering world-class guilt trips over every inconsequential thing. Hers is a mass murderer with a demon in her brain. That’s much easier.

The production uses a new, patent-pending method of volumetric capture to turn its actors into geometric objects and put them in digitally created or enhanced environments. Demonic reportedly uses more volumetric capture footage than any other feature film. Neill Blomkamp secretly filmed the movie during the pandemic last year in Canada, which is well known for its frequent demonic possessions. Seeing as how it’s from the man who brought us District 9, Elysium, and Chappie I think we can assume the corporation is evil and the demonic entity is simply a misunderstood creature from the wrong side of the dimensional barrier looking to make lifelong friendships.

Demonic is in theaters and VOD on August 20th.