The Adams family are back to puzzle and delight devotees of pugnaciously independent, DIY horror. After the witchy, feminist Bildungsroman of Hellbender, Toby Poser, and John, Zelda, and Lulu Adams have returned with something completely different. A seductive and sinister gothic picaresque, Where the Devil Roams is wider in scope and more ambitious in storytelling than its predecessor, and its combination of oneiric, impressionistic narrative with the gnarliest of practical gore is irresistible.

Seven, Maggie, and Eve are a family of sideshow performers who have found themselves in a crisis during the Great Depression. After Eve steals the macabre secret behind the more profitable grand guignol acts of a fellow carny, they set off on a bloody road trip across the country, with their artistic expression evolving in weird and disturbing ways as they go.

This beautiful and esoteric slice of American gothic recalls all manner of sources: the classic road movie, the depression-era literature of Faulkner, Nightmare Alley, the sadly curtailed series Carnivàle, Fellini, The Seventh Seal, and Tod Browning, among others. But the unique sensibility of the Adams’ means that although the film seems moulded from the distinctive fingerprints of myriad influences, it is far from generic.

The Adams’ draw on the rich heritage of the early decades of the 20th century but they are not entirely slavish to aesthetic authenticity. Their own score (as H6llb6nd6r), is sinewy, growling, bass-driven garage rock; rooted in the blues for sure but with The Stooges, The Jesus Lizard, and Jon Spencer more obvious progenitors than Lead Belly or Robert Johnson. It is obviously anachronistic but works splendidly. Similarly, the opulently tattooed and pierced carnies look like the more obviously modern kind of ‘freaks,’ more Jim Rose than Jim Crow.

A surreal and dread-laden atmosphere drives Where the Devil Roams. as potent as illicit hooch. It retains the twisted family dynamics and the empathy for the outsider and the misfit that characterised Hellbender, but its narrative is far less direct, more akin to the common vignettist presentation of many road movies. This dislocation is deepened by stylistic switches from colour to black-and-white, various jumps in perspective between its three pro/antagonists, and various flashbacks and monologues from the family’s victims. Some may find this throttles the momentum, but if one can channel into its choppy dream logic, then it is a constantly shifting, exhilarating experience.

Concealed within its dreamy structure are its themes of poverty, trauma, and grief, tackled with a sense of subtlety missing from most genre films currently. Through this we also get darkly funny elements such as Seven’s aversion to blood after being shellshocked in the Great War. As a result, John, a generous performer, allows Toby as Maggie and Zelda as Eve to function as the catalysts in the narrative.

Maggie has a touch of Kathleen Turner in Serial Mom about her as she dispatches luckless victims for the flimsiest of slights. She is riddled by a sense of intellectual insecurity beside her husband’s medical and literary knowledge, and it takes little to trigger her fury, with sometimes hilarious, and often sickening results. Zelda’s almost mute Eve is another sign of the ambition at work. It is a difficult role, but Zelda is effortlessly charismatic, capable of causing chills with an ethereal lift of an eyebrow. She is quietly the eye of the storm through which everything hurls at increasing velocity.

We are now surely at the stage where the inspiring tale of the Adams’ themselves ceases to be the locus of interest, and their films take centre stage. While one has the feeling that Hellbender will linger close to many hearts in the years to come, Where the Devil Roams is their greatest achievement to date. You can only admire the ambition, confidence, and the trust in each other that permeates every challenging, bewildering frame. It also provides a satisfying ending of hysterical audacity that takes the cliché of a tight-knit family to a seriously fucked-up new level.

Where the Devil Roams had it’s UK Premiere at FrightFest. It awaits an official UK release date.