Hail Satan?

The Satanic Temple is part-religion, part-political protest movement, and like both of these, it’s a complex multi-headed beast, with a mix of showmanship, activism, community work and performance art. Penny Lane’s documentary about the movement is, inevitably, somewhat of a promotion-effort (all the talking heads interviews are with members, although one of them has become disassociated with the Temple).  And there really isn’t a lot of interrogation about how effective they’ve been by being, basically, as deliberately disruptive as the Christian right is, just from the opposite direction. And given that the main political action it covers (protests against the 10 commandments monolith at the state house in Alabama) is still ongoing, there isn’t really the satisfying resolution you may be looking for. Still, this is a look at how a radical movement becomes part of the political discourse, how the use of extreme imagery can work to unite people, and it also has a lot of shots of naked men. It’s an interesting take on a provocative part of modern political discourse.