Ranking 20 Of The Best Movies About The Devil
Plenty of movie villains cause trouble, but the Devil tends to walk in like he already owns the place. That is probably why so many filmmakers keep coming back to him.
He can be elegant, cruel, funny, or quietly terrifying, and the really good movies know that the character works best when he feels less like a creature and more like a presence nobody can fully control.
That is what makes ranking movies about the Devil so much fun. The strongest ones are not just trying to scare anybody.
They know temptation is more interesting than noise, and dread lasts longer when it slips into ordinary life.
Every film ahead finds its own way to tap into that uneasy pull, which is exactly what keeps this kind of story so watchable.
Disclaimer: This article is intended for general informational and entertainment purposes only. Film rankings and interpretations of religious or supernatural themes reflect editorial opinion, and individual views may vary.
1. The Exorcist (1973)
Widely considered the scariest movie ever made, this 1973 masterpiece by William Friedkin changed horror forever.
Young Regan MacNeil becomes possessed by a terrifying demon, and two priests race against time to save her soul. The film was so shocking that audiences reportedly fainted in theaters!
Remarkably, it became the first horror film ever nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture. That is no small feat for a genre Hollywood often overlooked.
The practical effects still hold up today, proving that real craft beats CGI tricks every single time.
2. Rosemary’s Baby (1968)
Roman Polanski crafted one of cinema’s most unsettling slow-burn horrors with this 1968 classic.
Mia Farrow plays Rosemary Woodhouse, a young woman who begins suspecting her neighbors and even her own husband have made a deal with the Devil involving her unborn child.
What makes this film genuinely creepy is how ordinary everything looks. The terror hides behind friendly smiles and cozy apartments, which is honestly scarier than any monster.
Fun fact: the Dakota Building in New York City served as the filming location, the same building where John Lennon later lived.
3. The Omen (1976)
If a child at a birthday party causes a giraffe to go haywire and a nanny to jump off a roof, that is a major red flag.
Gregory Peck stars as an American diplomat who slowly realizes his adopted son Damien might literally be the Antichrist.
The Omen is a masterclass in building dread through atmosphere rather than jump scares.
Jerry Goldsmith’s iconic choral score won the Academy Award for Best Original Score and remains one of the most chilling soundtracks in film history.
4. The Witch (2015)
Set in 1630s New England, this slow-burning nightmare from director Robert Eggers feels less like a movie and more like stepping into a terrifying fever dream.
A Puritan family is banished from their plantation and forced to live alone near a dark, foreboding forest. Things go very wrong, very fast.
The dialogue is drawn directly from real historical documents of the era, which adds an unsettling layer of authenticity. Horror fans call it a folk horror masterpiece.
Warning: you will probably never look at farm animals the same way again.
5. Angel Heart (1987)
Picture a gritty 1950s private detective story that slowly transforms into something far darker and more supernatural than you ever expected.
Mickey Rourke plays Harry Angel, hired by a mysterious client named Louis Cyphre (get it? Lucifer!) played by a brilliantly creepy Robert De Niro to track down a missing singer.
The film is soaked in New Orleans atmosphere, voodoo rituals, and mounting dread. Every clue Harry uncovers drags him closer to a devastating truth about his own identity.
The twist ending genuinely floors viewers every single time.
6. The Devil’s Advocate (1997)
Keanu Reeves plays hotshot lawyer Kevin Lomax, who lands a dream job at a powerful New York law firm run by the charming, terrifying John Milton, played by Al Pacino at his absolute most electrifying.
Spoiler alert: Milton is the Devil. Pacino clearly had the time of his life in this role.
The film brilliantly uses legal drama as a metaphor for moral corruption and temptation. How far will you go to win?
The climactic speech Pacino delivers is legendary. Vanity is definitely his favorite sin, and watching him deliver that line is pure cinematic gold worth rewatching repeatedly.
7. Constantine (2005)
Keanu Reeves appears again on this list, this time as John Constantine, a chain-smoking supernatural detective who can see demons walking among humans and is desperately trying to earn his way into Heaven.
Based on the DC Comics character Hellblazer, the film builds an incredibly detailed mythology of angels and demons.
Though critics were mixed at release, Constantine developed a massive following over the years. The version of Hell shown here, a scorched mirror image of Los Angeles, is genuinely haunting.
Tilda Swinton’s androgynous archangel Gabriel nearly steals the entire movie with effortless, otherworldly cool.
8. Legend (1985)
This stunning dark fantasy features Tim Curry as Darkness who is arguably the most visually spectacular Devil ever put on film.
The towering red demon with enormous curved horns is a practical makeup masterpiece that took hours to apply daily. Curry absolutely owns every single scene he inhabits.
Tom Cruise stars as a forest boy named Jack who must stop Darkness from plunging the world into eternal night.
Though the story is fairly simple, the visuals are breathtaking and the atmosphere is pure fairy tale magic gone wonderfully wrong. The Jerry Goldsmith score adds enormous emotional depth throughout.
9. The Ninth Gate (1999)
Roman Polanski returns to this list with a stylish occult thriller starring Johnny Depp as rare book dealer Dean Corso, hired to authenticate a legendary manuscript supposedly co-written by the Devil himself.
Traveling across Europe, Corso discovers increasingly dangerous people willing to kill for the book.
The film has a wonderfully slow, puzzle-box quality that rewards patient viewers. Some critics dismissed it, but devoted fans consider it one of Depp’s most underrated performances.
The European locations, including castles in Portugal and France, give the film a genuinely old-world, eerie atmosphere that feels completely unique among Devil movies.
10. Prince of Darkness (1987)
The genius behind Halloween and The Thing, brought his unique scientific horror approach to the Devil story in this seriously underrated 1987 chiller.
A group of graduate students and a priest discover a mysterious cylinder of swirling liquid in an abandoned Los Angeles church. The liquid is pure evil, literally.
Carpenter blends quantum physics with ancient theology in ways that genuinely make your brain hurt in the best possible way.
The dream sequences, supposedly broadcast from the future, are among the most unsettling moments in 1980s horror.
11. Suspiria (1977)
This Italian horror masterpiece is less a traditional Devil movie and more a fever dream drenched in neon colors, prog rock music, and absolute nightmare logic.
An American ballet student arrives at a prestigious German dance academy and discovers it is run by an ancient coven of witches with demonic ties.
The visual style here is unlike anything else in horror history. Argento uses color like a weapon, bathing scenes in vivid reds and blues that feel simultaneously beautiful and deeply wrong.
Though supernatural rather than strictly Satanic, the evil here is unmistakably devilish in every frame.
12. Bedazzled (1967)
Long before comedy-Devil films became a formula, this wickedly clever 1967 British gem set the gold standard.
Peter Cook plays the Devil as a bored, petty, and hilariously passive-aggressive schemer who grants bumbling cook Stanley Moon (Dudley Moore) seven wishes in exchange for his soul.
Every wish goes spectacularly wrong in the funniest possible ways, skewering everything from romance to religion with sharp British wit.
Cook and Moore’s real-life comedic partnership makes the chemistry between Devil and victim feel genuinely electric. If you have never seen this original, track it down immediately.
13. The Witches of Eastwick (1987)
Jack Nicholson playing the Devil as an irresistible, slobbish, charismatic bad boy is genuinely one of cinema’s great casting decisions.
Three independent women in a small New England town accidentally conjure the Devil through their shared wishes, and what follows is equal parts comedy, horror, and feminist commentary.
Cher, Susan Sarandon, and Michelle Pfeiffer bring enormous energy and humor as the three witches who eventually turn the tables on their supernatural seducer.
Based on John Updike’s novel, the film balances laughs and chills with impressive skill.
14. End of Days (1999)
Arnold Schwarzenegger vs. Satan. That sentence alone should sell this movie entirely.
Released at the peak of apocalypse anxiety in 1999, this action-horror hybrid features Arnie as a burned-out security guard who becomes humanity’s last line of defense against the Devil trying to conceive a child before midnight on New Year’s Eve.
Gabriel Byrne plays the Devil with smooth, menacing charm, making an interesting counterpoint to Schwarzenegger’s beefy heroics.
Though critics were not exactly kind, the film delivers exactly what it promises: big explosions, biblical prophecy, and one very determined Austrian action star punching evil in the face.
15. The Blackcoat’s Daughter (2015)
Quiet, cold, and deeply unsettling, this slow-burn horror from director Oz Perkins is one of the most atmospheric Devil films of the modern era.
Two girls are left behind at their boarding school over winter break while a mysterious third young woman travels toward the school for unknown reasons.
The film weaves these storylines together with patient, deliberate pacing that rewards attentive viewers with a genuinely devastating payoff.
Emma Roberts and Kiernan Shipka both deliver haunting performances. However, it is the film’s suffocating sense of loneliness that truly gets under your skin and stays there long after viewing.
16. Drag Me to Hell (2009)
Sam Raimi, the genius behind the Evil Dead franchise, returned to horror with this wildly entertaining supernatural rollercoaster that balances genuine scares with gleeful gross-out comedy.
Bank loan officer Christine Brown denies an old woman a mortgage extension and is immediately cursed by a demonic spirit called the Lamia.
From that point forward, the film becomes a relentless, creative, and often surprisingly funny battle for Christine’s soul.
Raimi clearly had an absolute blast directing this one. The anvil scene, the stapler fight, and the finale are all unforgettable.
17. Hellbound: Hellraiser II (1988)
Where the original Hellraiser introduced audiences to the terrifying Cenobites and their hellish dimension, this 1988 sequel boldly takes viewers directly inside Hell itself.
Kirsty Cotton returns to face the demonic forces that destroyed her family, this time navigating a vast, labyrinthine underworld ruled by a being called Leviathan.
Clive Barker’s original creation gets expanded in genuinely imaginative and disturbing ways here.
The production design of Hell is extraordinary for its budget, a dark geometric nightmare of endless corridors and suffering.
18. South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut (1999)
Nobody expected an animated comedy about four foul-mouthed kids from Colorado to produce one of the sharpest, most brilliantly structured movie musicals of the 1990s.
Satan here is portrayed as a sensitive, misunderstood romantic who is literally dating Saddam Hussein, and somehow that absurd premise becomes genuinely touching and hilarious.
Trey Parker and Matt Stone use their Devil character to skewer censorship, war hysteria, and cultural hypocrisy with razor-sharp wit.
Certified fresh with critics, the film earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Song. Absolutely nobody saw that coming.
19. The Devil and Daniel Webster (1941)
Based on Stephen Vincent Benet’s short story, this 1941 American classic tells the tale of a New Hampshire farmer who sells his soul to Mr. Scratch, a folksy but terrifying American version of the Devil, in exchange for seven years of prosperity.
Walter Huston’s portrayal of Mr. Scratch is one of cinema’s most uniquely American interpretations of evil.
The climactic courtroom scene, where Webster argues before a jury of history’s greatest villains, remains genuinely thrilling.
How do you argue against the Devil? Apparently, with incredible passion and patriotism.
20. Faust (1926)
Nearly a century old and still absolutely stunning, F.W. Murnau’s silent masterpiece brings the legendary German Faust legend to life with breathtaking visual artistry.
The opening sequence, where the demon Mephisto spreads his enormous dark wings over an entire village, is one of cinema’s most iconic images and was achieved entirely with practical in-camera effects.
Emil Jannings plays Mephisto with theatrical, gleeful menace that somehow transcends the silence of the medium entirely.
Though made without sound, the film communicates pure evil more effectively than most modern horror blockbusters with full audio.
