TO THE DEVIL A DAUGHTER

Catherine Beddows leaves the convent. The sect led by Father Michael Rayner wants to use her to awaken the demon Astaroth. To protect her, her father calls on John Verney, a writer and expert in Satanism. Verney takes the young girl into his home but occult forces keep trying to lure her away, in a long-distance duel with the soul of Nastassja Kinski (14 years-old at the time) at stake. A contest fought between Richard Widmark, embroiled in a diabolical story whose impact he is slow to understand, and Christopher Lee, an unfrocked priest with a disturbingly calm demeanour.

A feeling of permanent danger hovers over this penultimate Hammer production, with terrifying sequences that recall William Friedkin’s The Exorcist.