Did these 6 movies about Satan accidentally summon him to their sets?

Horror has always had a respectability problem. But filmmakers eventually discovered a useful trick for getting around it: Make the monster a metaphor.

The creature in “The Babadook” isn’t merely a boogeyman under the bed; it’s grief and depression. “It Follows” has been read as everything from an allegory for sexually transmitted disease to a story about sexual trauma and mortality. Jordan Peele’s “Get Out” turned body-snatching horror into an examination of race and liberal paternalism. Even “Hereditary,” which gives us actual demons, comes wrapped in grief, mental illness, and inherited trauma.

Moore was said to have been decapitated, horribly echoing the death Richardson had devised for the movie.

Nothing wrong with that. Horror works best when it gives physical form to intangible fears.

But the metaphor also provides