A grim, Southern-Gothic crime drama with strong atmosphere, committed performances, and a relentless sense of dread, but its sprawling structure and bleakness can feel overstuffed and emotionally punishing. It’s worth it if you want a nasty, fatalistic descent through faith, violence, and generational damage.
35% ★★☆☆☆ (685,087)
The Devil All the Time
Where to watch: Netflix
Movie · Crime · Drama · R
2020 · 2h 18m · ★ 35% (685.1K)
Everyone ends up in the same damned place.
Director: Antonio Campos
Starring: Tom Holland, Robert Pattinson, Bill Skarsgård
Overview
In Knockemstiff, Ohio and its neighboring backwoods, sinister characters converge around young Arvin Russell as he fights the evil forces that threaten him and his family.
Director
Antonio Campos
Production
Nine Stories Productions, BorderLine Films, Bronx Moving Co.
Cast
Tom Holland, Robert Pattinson, Bill Skarsgård, Riley Keough, Jason Clarke, Sebastian Stan, Haley Bennett, Harry Melling, Eliza Scanlen, Mia Wasikowska, Douglas Hodge, Kristin Griffith, Pokey LaFarge, Donald Ray Pollock, Banks Repeta, Emilio Subercaseaux Campos, David Atkinson, Matthew Vaughn, Billy Joe Bradshaw, Gregory Kelly
Where to watch
Netflix, Netflix Standard with Ads
Curator Review
Verdict
A grim, Southern-Gothic crime drama with strong atmosphere, committed performances, and a relentless sense of dread, but its sprawling structure and bleakness can feel overstuffed and emotionally punishing. It’s worth it if you want a nasty, fatalistic descent through faith, violence, and generational damage.
Best for
viewers who like dark, literary crime dramas
fans of Southern Gothic mood and rural decay
people drawn to ensemble tragedies with moral rot
audiences who don’t mind a slow, oppressive tone
Skip if
you want a tight, propulsive thriller
you’re sensitive to abuse, cruelty, and despair
you prefer hopeful or cathartic endings
you dislike episodic, sprawling storytelling
Overview
The Devil All the Time is less a thriller than a doom-laden procession of bad choices, warped faith, and inherited violence. Antonio Campos builds a world that feels sticky with sweat, rot, and religious mania, and the film’s best asset is its atmosphere: every town, church, and roadside home seems contaminated before the characters even arrive.
Worth noting
The performances are uneven in aggregate but often striking in isolation, with several actors leaning hard into grotesque, memorable turns. The film’s biggest problem is that it keeps introducing fresh misery without always deepening its emotional impact, so the cumulative effect can become numbing rather than devastating.
Bottom line
Still, if you’re in the mood for a bleak American nightmare with literary ambitions and a strong sense of place, it has enough visual and tonal force to hold attention. It’s the kind of movie that lingers more as a mood and a collection of images than as a perfectly shaped narrative.
Top Letterboxd reviews
Dawson (2★) · 6819 likes
this one goes out to the poor thirst watchers who just wanted to watch Tom Holland and R Patts slick back their greasy hair and smoke cigarettes but instead have to suffer through the cinematic equivalent of a piece of drywall
emma (4.5★) · 4240 likes
AYOO 🔊 AYOO 🔊I DONT THINK PRAYING IS SUPPOSE TO WORK LIKE THAT 🔊 I SAID I DONT THINK PRAYING IS SUPPOSE TO WORK LIKE THAT 🔊
demi adejuyigbe · 3792 likes
Pattinson’s accent and the weird ass score had me sayin’ “what the devil” all the time, I tell you what!
mia lee vicino (3★) · 2846 likes
major déjà vu to a year ago when i thirst-watched The King, another gritty 2+ hour Netflix drama, for robert pattinson only for him to show up an hour in, do a batshit accent, and leave with 30 minutes left.* starting to worry i’ve been afflicted by some sort of witch’s curse...? anyway, here’s a real thought so i don’t get yelled at: this feels like an ineffective mash-up of The Tree of Life, There Will Be Blood, Zodiac, and… more
andrea🌹 (3★) · 2633 likes
must a movie be good? is it not enough that it is a white man buffet?
2014 · Crime, Thriller · 1h 30m · Where to watch: Philo, Amazon Video, Google Play Movies, YouTube, Fandango At Home, The CW, Fawesome, Fandango at Home Free, Plex, Tubi TV
Sparse, grim revenge drama with a raw sense of consequence and desperation.