The family that makes horror movies together, stays together, and keeps making horror movies together. The Adams family – Toby Poser, John Adams, and their daughters, Zelda and Lulu; not the ones from the comic panels or macabre movies – figured out the secret about a decade ago: Build a production company out of whatever materials are on hand, take on each role and all duties required in film production, and shoot microbudget pictures with your kids. Some people schedule game nights for family bonding; the Adamses make movies like The Deeper You Dig, last year’s Hellbender and, now, Where the Devil Roams.
The Adamses don’t have Marvel money. They hardly have money at all. But what they achieve regardless across their filmography is miraculous (and unavailable to glossy, overfunded productions): A demonstration of cinema as an accessible artform open to whoever has the nerve and grit and ingenuity. In competitive parlance, it’s a matter of wanting it. From the outside, that appears to be the Adamses’ ethos, but the relaxed, easygoing manner baked into their films gives the impression of naturalism. They’re just good at this.
Where the Devil Roams takes that innate gift for making movies to new, ambitious and uncharacteristically gruesome places. The Deeper You Dig and Hellbender both rely on atmosphere and sensation, prioritizing emotional resonance over the visceral effect of gorier details. In Where the Devil Roams, there will be blood, lots of blood; axes, cast iron skillets, ice picks, glass shards and fire pokers do a lot of leg work (and neck work, and skull work) for the Adamses’ characters, Seven (John), Maggie (Poser), and Eve (Zelda), likewise a family making horror shows for a paying audience. The difference is the period (Depression-era America), and the vocation (sideshow acts), and of course a habit of murdering society’s haves for extra scratch. Like the Adamses themselves, Where the Devil Roams’ trio have their parts to play: Seven stands stock still and blindfolded to the carnage, Eve photographs the aftermath, and Maggie does, well, everything else.
Where the Devil Roams takes an episodic approach to their story, following them as they drive from place to place, putting on their show for scant audiences and slaughtering hapless wealthy dolts along the way. In most cases, the victims have it coming: A philanderer, a judge, a land baron. In others, they’re collateral damage, like the Norwegian farmer whom Maggie mistakes for a German and slays in vengeful wrath. Seven fought in the Great War, which left him with PTSD and so averse to spilled vita that the sight of it sends him into near-catatonia – hence the blindfold. So Maggie exacts some justice on her husband’s behalf, only she’s unaccustomed to the differences between the Nordic and the Germanic. Somehow, the Adamses manage to play this as a tender gag: Maggie isn’t without her scruples; she just loves Seven so much that she’d kill a man for him. It’s a dangerous form of sweetness.
If Where the Devil Roams has any antecedents, they’re in the ballpark of Carnivale and The Devil’s Rejects, with an unexpected dash of Hemingway for good measure: Grisly, grungy, a tad anarchic and, in its gentler moments, poetic — even romantic. Remarkably, the Adamses see these qualities as harmonic. It could be that their cinema’s character is a natural expression of their family bond, because families are nothing if not complex in contradictory ways. In the movie’s context, that’s best exemplified by Maggie, handy with anything sharp enough to pierce a person’s throat or cave in their craniums, while ready and willing to give everything for her unconditional love of Eve and Seven.
The roughness around their edges parallels the intentional raggediness of the Adamses’ aesthetic. Whatever the film, whatever the setting, whatever the niche, their work feels handmade, and that texture gives Where the Devil Roams earthly grounding for staging its savage violence. Maggie, Seven and Zelda’s story reads an effective reflection of a time in American history where the majority of its people lived on the edge and around the fringe; it feels unmoored from that history at the same time, through the coarseness of the Adamses’ technique. That contrast between real and surreal, craftsmanship and pathos, has absorbing power — the “let’s put on a show” quality that keeps each Adams movie tucked under one umbrella. Where the Devil Roams takes up the most space in their body of work. It’s their biggest swing to date. But the payoff is grand, as a macabre exercise and a moving gut punch. The Adamses clearly have confidence in their cinema, even if their laidback style veils it well. With Where the Devil Roams, maybe they’ll wear that confidence on their sleeves in the future.
Directors: John Adams, Zelda Adams, Toby Poser
Writers: John Adams, Zelda Adams, Toby Poser
Starring: John Adams, Zelda Adams, Toby Poser, Sam Rodd, Harald Sørlie, Lulu Adams, Nathaniel Meek
Release Date: September 22, 2023 (Fantastic Fest)
Bostonian culture journalist Andy Crump covers the movies, beer, music, and being a dad for way too many outlets, perhaps even yours. He has contributed to Paste since 2013. You can follow him on Twitter: and find his collected work at his personal blog. He’s composed of roughly 65% craft beer.