So the third entry in The Conjuring Universe has just released a week early in the UK,
and I have had a chance to see the film early.
With The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It, there's a lot to unpack surrounding
the plot, the ending, the real-life story and potential sequels.
To put it more simply, I'm going to be explaining the plot and ending for The Conjuring 3, in
the aim to help you guys gather a greater sense of what happened.
This analysis will also contain spoilers, so if you do happen to be
someone who hasn't seen the film yet, then I would recommend watching this video after
you've seen it.
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But without further ado, let's dive into The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It explained.
So like the other two Conjuring movies, The Devil Made Me Do It was inspired by a real-life
case that Ed and Lorraine Warren worked on.
However, this time, It's not a haunted house tale, as the third movie not
only takes its plot from a 1981 murder but also its title.
The trial of Arne Johnson was known as 'The Devil Made Me Do It'
case and Johnson had asserted that he was possessed by a demon, and therefore not legally
responsible for a crime.
It's a defence that seems too bizarre to be true, yet it really happened.
But what were the details of the real case and how accurate is The Conjuring: The Devil
Made Me Do It?
Well, on the face of it, it seems fairly straightforward – and devastatingly upsetting.
After an altercation between Johnson and his landlord Alan Bono, Johnson murdered Bono
and fled the scene, but it's the before-and-after of the crime itself that includes the more
supernatural twists.
And there are a fair few characters in here, all intertwined around this narrative.
In addition to Arne, there's his fiancée Debbie Glatzel, her younger brother David
(who was 11 at the time) and their mother Judy Glatzel.
Judy told People magazine that her son saw "a man with big black eyes, a thin face with
animal features, pointed ears, horns and hoofs".
They were so frightened that Judy and Debbie asked Arne to move into the Glatzel family
home for help.
When David's visions worsened, the Glatzels called on famed demonologists Ed and Lorraine
Warren to perform an exorcism on the young boy.
They performed a series of exorcisms on him, during one of which Arne taunted the demon
to leave David and enter him, instead – though this seemed to no avail at the time.
According to Lorraine, "David made numerous references to murder and stabbings, and eventually,
unable to manage the situation any longer, Debbie and Arne moved out.
Debbie was hired by Alan Bono to work as a dog groomer at the Brookfield Pet Motel, and
she and Arne were given the apartment to rent, with Bono becoming her employer and their
landlord.
Meanwhile, there was a noted change in Arne, and Debbie had told People magazine, that
he would go into a trance, growling and saying he saw the beast.
Later he would have no memory of any of it, reminiscent of what the 11-year-old David
had experienced."
The day of the murder itself, on February 16th, 1981, was
unremarkable, according to Debbie.
Bono took Debbie, Arne, Arne's sisters, and Debbie's 9-year-old cousin Mary out for lunch
where he drank a fair bit of wine.
After a further uneventful afternoon, Debbie took
the girls for pizza only to hurry back sensing that there was tension.
Bono was said to be drunk and agitated, and before Debbie and Arne could flee again with
the girls, he grabbed the youngest cousin and wouldn't let her go.
As Debbie went to get her from him, Arne returned.
The article continues detailing that "The children ran for the car and Debbie Glatzel
was between the two men.
Wanda said 'He was like a stone and you couldn't physically move him.
She saw something shiny flash in the air, and then, she says, 'It just stopped.'
And when it was over, Arne walked into the woods, staring straight ahead, and Alan Bono
just stood there, punching his fist into his palm until eventually dying.
Not far from him was the knife with the five-inch blade that Johnson always carried."
Bono died from four or five tremendous wounds and Johnson was later found and arrested two
miles from the scene of the murder.
Police Chief John Anderson deemed it, not an unusual crime.
Somebody got angry, an argument resulted.
It was soon after that the possession defence was rejected by the judge, and the jury never
heard it.
Johnson was convicted of manslaughter on November 24th,
1981 and served five years of the 10 to 20-year sentence.
But when it comes to the events of the so-called 'The Devil Made Me Do It' case, the movie
is accurate to how it was reported by those involved, such as the Warrens,
Johnson and Debbie Glatzel.
The movie opens with the exorcism of David Glatzel, although alters the timeline somewhat
so that the exorcism is on July the 18th, 1981,
months after Johnson had murdered Alan Bono in real life.
But it shows Johnson inviting the demon inside of him and his reported strange behaviour
after the exorcism.
Alan Bono has also been renamed as Bruno in the movie, but otherwise, the murder plays
out as it was reported, with Johnson stabbing Bruno multiple times.
The Warrens then offer to help with Johnson's defence at the trial as they were involved
in the exorcism.
However, it's here where The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It differs greatly from real-life
events, with a fictionalised account of them investigating the supposed demonic possession
of Johnson, and David Glatzel previously.
It ends up involving a Satanist known only as The Occultist who is
carrying out a curse that saw her target two girls in Danvers, Massachusetts and, during
the movie's final act, Ed Warren is also targeted to stop Lorraine from stopping the curse.
During this time, The Occultist is also continuing to target Johnson in prison, with Debbie and
David helping to protect him.
It turns out that all of The Occultist's victims live close by, and the Warrens work out that
she is operating from Kastner's home.
They had visited Kastner's home earlier in the film, and we
know that he had dealt with the Disciples of the Ram cult, which is a nod to the Annabelle
series.
He tells them in the moment that the 'why is irrelevant in terms of David's curse as
the only aim of the person, The Occultist, who left the Witch's Totem, is chaos.
He tells them that the curse needs three victims to be complete, which includes the child,
Jessica, the lover, Arne, and the man of God, who is Ed Warren, and The Occultist's soul
rests on completing the curse.
Kastner also reveals that he raised a daughter in secret from the church and his interest
in the occult led to a fascination in his daughter Lola, which turns
out to be The Occultist herself.
We learn that she operates from the tunnels under the land which she explored as a child
and Lorraine heads down into the tunnels to destroy the altar.
The Occultist arrives and kills her father, before setting Ed onto Lorraine again and
trying to get Arne to kill himself in jail.
What the whole movie brinks on, however, is the love the Warrens have for each other and
Lorraine reminds Ed of their first date when they spent time in a gazebo as it was raining.
She thinks their love is a weakness, but as we learn it's their strength, ultimately,
leading to Ed snapping out of the curse.
As in the previous Conjuring movies, the events are treated as fact so it makes sense that
the movie takes creative licence with the real-life events after the murder and trial
to provide a glammed up conclusion.
As director Michael Chaves puts it, the Warrens believed what happened to Johnson was true
and they put their careers on the line for it.
These stories are always about faith and where usually the expectation is the faith in God,
in this film, it's also like the faith we put into other people, the faith we put in
people we share our life with and choose to love.
So the filmmaker has essentially tried to infuse the story of Arne and Debbie into the
story of Ed and Lorraine Warren.
For me, this works brilliantly in the first two acts of the film and connecting these
themes made sense to the story they were telling.
I did think that The Occultist elements did need a bit more fleshing out and it felt more
like a traditional horror conclusion to the events, but regardless, the story of
Arne and linking it to the exploration of the Warrens was the best they could do when
it came to telling the history of this event.
The film's conclusion takes form with Ed destroying the altar, saving himself, Lorraine and Arne
in the process.
Unfortunately for The Occultist, she promised a demon a
soul and it can't go back to Hell without one, so it takes The Occultist instead.
Ed and Lorraine put the cup from the altar in their creepy room of artefacts which we've
seen plenty of in previous films, placing it alongside the Valak painting and the Annabelle
doll.
Arne is convicted of manslaughter, as in real-life where the demonic possession defence was thrown
out, but only ends up serving five years of his sentence.
With the movie ending on Ed showing Lorraine a gazebo he built in their garden,
it also serves as a sweet tribute to the late Lorraine Warren who passed away before the
movie went into production.
So where are these real characters now?
Well, as mentioned before and in the closing titles of the movie, Johnson served five years
of the full sentence and was released in January 1986 because of his good behaviour.
Johnson married Debbie Glatzel while he was in prison in January 1984 and the movie states
that they remain married to this day.
However, according to the director, Debbie sadly passed away from cancer shortly before
the movie's release.
This is the story of Arne and also his girlfriend who became his wife, Debbie Glatzel.
She was there during the exorcism, she was there at the murder and she testified for
him and she believed in him.
She stood by that and they've been married the rest of her life.
Not much is known about Johnson's life after his release beyond his marriage, although
Lorraine Warren said in 1986 that Johnson was ready to work for a landscaper
in town and he's coming home to live in a very good family atmosphere.
Ed Warren added that "Possession doesn't last 24 hours a
day.
It comes quickly and leaves quickly.
Arne understands what happened to him and he now knows how to ward it off if it happens
and he won't be stupid enough to take on the devil again."
The most notable development in the case since Johnson's release came in 2007 when Carl,
the middle Glatzel child, claimed the Warrens had fabricated the whole story, using their
family tragedy to gain fame.
Arne and Debbie backed the Warrens' story and Debbie was also involved in the marketing
for the movie, recalling her experiences of the traumatic events that inspired the new
movie.
I guess it's up to the viewer to decide what they think of the real events covered in the
film, but I must say they did a decent job of portraying
the real-life story of Arne, the emotional connections to Ed and Loraine Warren, and
the demonic possession that occurred.
But that was my video explaining the plot and ending for The Conjuring: The Devil Made
Me Do It.
I hope this did help some of you guys understand the events a bit better and I'm looking forward
to hearing what else you picked out, so don't forget to let me know down below in the comments
section.
I will also be doing a video on A Quiet Place 2 when that releases next week, and
upcoming future projects in June, so look out for whenever I post.
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