I would consider myself to be somewhat of a religious horror fanatic, especially around the time of Halloween.
Genre Conventions - Content
Every religious horror movie comes up with it's own "rules" for the universe, but typical genre conventions of religious horror are the use of religious iconography suchs a crucifixes, rosaries, and holy water. Also, there is always one man, typically a priest, who reads words very aggressively from the Bible in attempt to vanquish a demon who had possessed one of the protagonists.
One of the most popular (arguably the most popular) religious horror movie is The Exorcist (1979), utilized a variety of these genre conventions. The famous scene from that movie specifically includes a priest who is yelling words of Christ at the possessed girl whilst sprinkling holy water on her and floating. The religious horror trifecta.
The Exorcist (1979)
Something that I can count on when I sit down to watch any religious horror movie is that there will be some kind of elaborate, sometimes over explained, backstory. This could be done for amny reasons, but the main one is probably to attempt to cover up any plot holes all in one five minute info-dump about why everything in the film is happening.
One of the most outrageous instances of over-explaining in a religious horror film has got to be in The Curse of La Llorona (2019). After the main villain, La Llorona, has done a sufficient amount of antagonizing, there is quite literally a five minute info-dumping break where the conversation feels overwhelmingly redundant and unnecessary. Unfortunately, this film is not the only one that has fallen victim to the over-explaining curse, but it is simply a consequence that comes with the job.
Genre Conventions - Production Techniques
Typically, in the religious horror subgenre, there are very, dull desaturated colors, which is sort of opposite of what religion is portrayed like in real life. Common colors are dull cool colors, mostly blue or cool shades of gray. This allows other colors, such as red (AKA danger colors), to stick out more, allowing the audience to focus on it.
The Conjuring 2 (2016)
For instance, this scene from The Conjuring 2 features a very dull looking room with those blues and grays, but the girl is wearing red pajamas, making her the focal point of the scen and the object of the terror surrounding her.
Another common production technique for religious horror would be costuming, specifically for religious horror movies that take place in common religious sites such convents. Many religious horror films take on the depiction of nuns, especially in modern times as horror films have branded them as being slightly creepy. Nevertheless, it is a common practice in these films to dress these women up in copy and paste clothing and allow the protagonist to stick out. This works in two facets: one, to create an us vs. them vibe between the nuns and the protagonist and two, to provide an eerie representation of uniformity among those groups of women.
The First Omen (2024)
An example of this would be in the film The First Omen. As can be seen in the still, the protagonist (in the black scarf) is distinct from the rest of the nuns in the convent, who are all dressed as the one behind her. In the context of this film, it foreshadows the reveal (SPOILERS) that the higher up nuns know something that the protagonist does not.
Institutional Conventions
When marketing religious horror films, production studios really take advantage of some of the mysterious associated religion, specifically those who do not know much about religion. For instance, earlier this year, to market the film The First Omen (2024), there was a confessional booth experience where people would go inside of a confessional booth and supernatural things would start happening. This tactic is feeding off of the people who are mystified by aspects of religion and want to experience it in a sensationalized manner.
Another classic marketing techniques for marketing a religious horror movie is saying that the film is based on a true story. When those words "based on a true story" flash on the screen during a horror movie trailer, audiences are instantly running to the theater. A good example of this is and of the Conjuring films. At the beginning of all of those movies, they give a little blurb describing the case and that at the end it reads, "Based on a true story".
The Conjuring (2013)
As seen in this trailer for The Conjuring, one of the main focal points of the trailer is the aspect of it being based on the true story of actual paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren who are notorious for sparking several franchises such as The Conjuring, but also The Amityville Horror series'.
Samples:
This film follows several of the genre conventions of religious horror when it comes to plot. There are several of thos conventions of priest reading a lot of prayers from the Bible, trying to push the demon away (it doesn't work). Also, there are many religious items in this film, the obvious ones like crucifixes and holy water. But, this move does have a sort of unconventional religious object for a religious horror film, that being the blood of Christ, which I think is a very fun addition. Also, this movie does fall victim to the over-explaining curse as they attempt to make the plot and ending make any sense.
With the production conventions, this movie did have great marketing, especially from the trailers. This film's marketing was really based on the frightening aspect of the concept of demonic nuns (what a fun oxymoron). The trailers for these movies really fed off of the jumpscares, wanting the viewers to jump out of their seats. For instance, here is a youtube ad for the movie. This kind of creative marketing is what religious horror movies use to suck in the viewers.
I know I said some not great things about this movie, but disclaimer, I do like it.
This movie depicts one of the most classic forms of exorcism. A girl in a bed shaking and convulsing while a priest is shouting latin at her, which makes sense with the plot as the film is all about exorcism. A good this about this movie is that it does not really fall victim to over-explanation. But, it is a good example of repurposing classic religious horror tropes in different ways, such as with the found footage element.
The marking for this movie actually had an insane sort of prank that was done on people in live chat rooms. This video is directly from the youtube account for this film, and is sort of a lesson to creeps out on the internet by jumpscaring them and then promoting the film. This definitly applies to the creative and out of the box marketing ideas that are typical of religious horror movies that allow the audience to be immersed in the world of the film.
More Religious Horror Films:
And now for this weeks movie quote of the week... (straight from another religious horror film)
"The court accepts the existence of God every time a witness swears to tell the truth. I think it's about time they accept the existence of the Devil." Ed Warren, The Conjuring 3: The Devil Made Me Do It
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