• Anneliese Michel was born on 21st September 1952 in Leiblfing, Bavaria, West Germany to a Catholic family. She was brought up along with three sisters by her parents, Josef and Anna. She was deeply religious and went for mass twice a week. Anneliese was a young, German Catholic who underwent an Exorcism and died within the same year due to her stopping any medical treatment psychiatric help.

• After this case there were many investigation cases carried out as well as court cases which led to public attention, which inspired the film makes of ‘The Exorcism Of Emily Rose’ to base the story of the narrative around Anneliese. When Anneliese was just sixteen she had her first epileptic attack and was then diagnosed with temporal lobe epilepsy. She was then diagnosed with depression shortly after this, and was then treated in a psychiatric hospital. By 1973, Anneliese became completely intolerant of various religious objects and even began to hear voices. As part of her psychiatric treatment, Michel went to San Damiano with a friend who regularly oganised pilgrimages to ‘holy places’. It was whilst they were there that the friend concluded that Michel was suffering from demonic possession as she could not even walk past holy objects such as a crucifix and refused to drink any holy water.

• From this her condition worsened Michel started to drink her own urine and even went to the extremes of eating insects and despite taking her medication she even became suicidal. Her family soon became extremely concerned and were sure she was possessed, so they reached out to the Catholic Priest to proceed an exorcism which was rejected at first. However in 1975 two priests were granted permission from the Bishop and demonstrated exorcism rites on Anneliese secretively. She died on 1st July 1976 and through a carried out investigation it was clear that she died due to starvation and dehydration in which her parents and the priests were blamed for negligence. It was described that her death was due to the strain of the rites that were carried out on her.

• Investigations also state that she could have been saved if she was given the right medical help, even if it was a day before. Therefore after this, there was major media and public attraction, especially as the Church allowed such a rite to be performed. After being found guilty the defendants were sentenced to six months in jail, but given three years of probation and a fine.

The Exorcism

• The exorcism took place with a priest named Ernst Alt, who had met Anneliese and told her that

what she was experiencing were not signs of any Epileptic fits. The priest believed that Anneliese was suffering from demonic possession and in which case urged the local bishop to allow the exorcism to be performed on Anneliese. •Whilst the process of the Exorcism was taking place, Anneliese wrote the priest Ernst a letter in 1975 claiming that ‘[she] is nothing, everything about me is vanity. What should I do, I have to improve you pray for me. She also stated within the letter ‘ I want to suffer for other people.. But this is so cruel..’ •Josef Stangl in September of the same year agreed for the priest Arnold Reinz the exorcism on Anneliese however he made it clear that he wanted this exorcism done in complete secrecy. •In late September, Arnold Reinz carried out many exorcism’s on Anneliese and soon her parents thought that they would stop seeking medical attention and medication but rely on just purely the exorcism’s on Anneliese in order to make her better...•Overall, there was a total of 67 exorcism’s performed on Anneliese over a duration of about ten months between the time period of 1975-1976. These exorcisms were performed roughly about once or twice a week by the priest each lasting a total of four hours long. •Anneliese soon became very tired, and weak and started to talk about dying. She soon started to refuse to eat towards the end of her exorcisms and eventually died in her home on the 1st July 1976.•After she died, a report stated that the cause of her death was due to malnutrition and dehydration as she suffered from starvation for almost a year whilst the exorcism's were taking place.

inspiration

• This particular Case Study inspired our group as part of our advanced portfolio we have had to choose a sub-genre in which we would like to base our work and narrative around, in which we have chosen the sub-genre of Possession where this particular real life case study and inspired us as Anneliese suffered from a real life demonic possession where she had to undertake several exorcisms. From looking into a real life possession, this has been entirely helpful for our group when making decisions for our preliminary tasks but also our narrative, as we have been able to focus on the effects of possession. Anneliese being the antagonist within this real life story had no control over what was occurring in her own body as the Possession had completely taken control. The topic of whether Possessions and exorcisms are real is very debatable however there is always truth behind every story and within our group whilst researching into real life case studies we have even questioned ourselves whether they are real presenting a clear link of the question of unknown. Through studying this case study thoroughly, as a group we have learnt and taken some inspirational ideas to use in our own work which we will link into our narrative and plot in order for the audience to be able to connect fully with the sub-genre of Possession. Within the case study Anneliese states that she hears noises and voices, this is a particular aspect of the study that we have taken to include within our own narrative as well as the religious elements as using religion within a Possession film is a clear convention used commonly.

• Below is the link to the film trailer that used Anneliese as an inspiration for their film :

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULuC2XkFiD8