Realm of Satan
Founded in San Francisco by Anton LaVey in 1966 and standing as its High Priest until his death, succeeded by Peter H Gilmore at which point the headquarters was relocated to New York, The Church of Satan is a body whose membership remains undisclosed, some estimates placing the numbers at a few thousand while the Church itself indicates it may be hundreds of times larger.
Written, directed and edited by Scott Cummings, while described as a documentary his film Realm of Satan is more of a visual collage of the members of the Church going about their daily lives, their household chores, their hobbies, their rituals, no stranger and certainly on the whole no more shocking than the ceremonies of other organised religions.
The film non-narrative, with no voiceover, explanatory or introductory text or interviews, the only words spoken are those of the rituals themselves or vicariously on archive footage viewed by the subjects on television, one of these a sad example of the persecution of members of the Church, the arson attack which totally destroyed the former home of “America’s Favourite Satanist,” the late Joe Netherworld, in Poughkeepsie, New York.
Yet those depicted, among them Gilmore and his wife, High Priestesss Maga Nadramia, on the whole seem mundane, enjoying their lives and their eccentricities, people with an affection for well-designed and tailored clothing, unusual pets, fast cars, and performance, whether it be fire dancing, stage magic or music, though it is an easy conclusion, perhaps based on a skewed sample, that the members are all conspicuously well-to-do or at least financially comfortable, free to indulge themselves without repercussion.
The tone of Realm of Satan never mocking, if it was Cummings’ intention to present the Church of Satan in a light of “they’re just like us,” it could be considered a success, though in this context “just like us” seems somewhat dull, ordinary people living ordinary lives, just dressed in black and sometimes in facepaint, the most debatably outrageous inclusions the PVC fetish party and the woman attempting to encourage an obviously indifferent baby goat to suckle her.
The Church of Satan unusual in that it does not actively solicit membership or proselytise, Realm of Satan can correspondingly not be looked on as a recruitment film, but as a depiction of outsiders it is less engaging than the photography of Diane Arbus seen on the wall in one scene, and while the Church was not the primary focus of The Last Sacrifice the interviewees in that documentary were more engaging, people with stories to tell and things to say about their unconventional lives and experiences.
Realm of Satan will be streaming on the Arrow platform from Friday 12th December
