REVIEW: 'The Devil All the Time' - a stellar cast with a less-than-stellar plot

“Excuse me, Preacher. Do you have time for a sinner?”

Sin finds us all. Sin corrupts everything we do. Sin's in our nature. It's in our blood. We run to the Lord time and time again in search of forgiveness. We cry out in vain searching for mercy! For hope! For salvation! But God isn't with us. Satan is the only power here. 

That's the central thesis of Antonio Campos’ new psychological thriller the Devil All the Time. Based upon the 2011 novel of the same name by American writer Donald Ray Pollock, the film follows a large ensemble of characters in a complex narrative centred around Arvin Russell (Tom Holland) and the dark happenings in the town of Knockemstiff, Ohio. Set of the course of two decades between the end of the Second World War and the mid-1960s, the Devil All the Time is a long, dark epic of violence and murder throughout a family's story.

“I’ve been doing wrong and I wanna get right by the Lord,” says Holland’s character echoing the vain attempts for redemption felt throughout the film.

Calling the film grizzly is almost an understatement. The entire narrative is steeped in the unholy. Each character finds themselves washed in the blood of the others. There’s the couple who hunts down lonely hitchhikers and leads them to a violent, fetishized end. There’s the lying, two-faced preacher who uses his power to prey upon young girls. There’s the traumatized father performing dark acts in the name of the Lord to save his wife. There’s the evangelist screaming out against the sinners of the world only to find himself committing more violence than the rest. Finally, there’s the son out for revenge on the men who caused his family harm. It’s this cast of characters that prove to the standout of the entire film. The film is stacked with talented performers who, each in their own right, give their all to brings these wicked and twisted characters to life. And while I believe everyone here deserves to be written about in detail, there are four performances I would like to bring a special light too.

The first and most notable performance comes from Tom Holland, the arguable star of the film, who is giving here his career-best performance as the haunted and vengeful Arvin Russel. The second is the performance of Robert Pattinson, continuing his explosion back into the mainstream, who portrays Reverend Preston Teagardin - a scummy pastor who lies his way into a position of prominence. Pattinson speaks in an impossible-to-place Southern drawl that makes his role standout in such prominence.

Another Marvel album joins in the cast in Sebastian Stan, my third favourite performance in the film. Stan portrays the most morally-centred of all of the characters and even he is impossible to like in the best way. We are introduced to Stan’s Sheriff Lee Bodecker as he gets it on with his girlfriend in his squad car before being called to duty. The film disservices Stan by pushing him to the back too many times, but his moments of stardom are among the film's best as he’s caught in a struggle between his moral duty and family ties.

The last performance I want to highlight comes from Eliza Scanlen, who took me by surprise in the film. Although many have taken to praise Bill Skarsgård as one of the best in the ensemble, I believe that it would wrong to not discuss Scanlen given how amazing he is and how new she is to the film scene. Having made here major feature film debut last December in Greta Gerwig’s astonishing Little Women (2019), Scanlen continues her career with the tragic and ill-fated Lenora Laferty. Playing excellently with Holland and Pattinson, Scanlen is subtle and heartbreaking and she proves that she has a promising career ahead of her as one of the most exciting new faces in the industry.

The ironic part of the Devil All the Time is that this same abundance of excellent characters proves to be the greatest stumbling block. The film is so incredibly dense in its plot and characters, it is difficult to really be taken away in the horror of it all. While individual scenes are well executed and the ominous, sacrilegious tone is perfectly tangible throughout - the film as a whole feels both overcrowded with no room to move or breathe.

The film adapts a very novelistic approach to storytelling. It is intricate and relies on a strong central narrator to deliver its narrative. This style works well in a novel! Novels have the appearance of someone telling you a story and can carefully explain the story to you. It works less so in a film where the primary delivery of information is not words but visuals. The Devil All the Time sabotages its own effectiveness by crowding too much into too little time. There a dark undercurrent to the whole thing, but Campos has simply not provided enough time for it to work in a visual medium.

The Devil All the Time is a chilling, wicked, and devilish film. It is filled with a fantastic cast and brilliant story, but not executed in the most effective manner. There’s so much to like about the project, but it doesn’t follow through as effectively as it should. It is a good film, but it could have been a great one and that is the frustrating part. I would encourage anyone who likes stories about twisted webs of characters or anyone who is a fan of the performers to watch it, but it is far from the masterwork it could have been. It left me wanting to read the book because I’m sure the original novel would be so much better and more effective for delivering this story.

Are you washed in the blood,

In the soul cleansing blood of the Lamb?

Are your garments spotless? Are they white as snow?

Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?

Score: 3

The Devil All the Time is now streaming on Netflix.

The Devil All the Time Quick Facts

Directed by Antonio Campos

Written by Antonio Campos and Paulo Campos

Starring Tom Holland, Robert Pattinson, Bill Skarsgård, Riley Keough, Jason Clarke, Harry Melling, Eliza Scanlen, and Sebastian Stan

Released September 16, 2020

138 minutes