The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
ATLANTA COUPLE’S MOVIE COMES OUT FRIDAY
The idea came to Jason DeVan early one morning.
He bolted up at 3 a.m. and shook his wife Heather awake.
“We are going to do a movie called ‘Tell Me Your Name,’” he announced. The epiphany lasted all of five minutes but the very next day the couple sat down and hammered out a 12-page treatment for the film.
At the time, the DeVans who have been married for 18 years, were making the usual rounds in Hollywood, acting and working on other projects but they were ready to make a bold move.
With their three kids in tow they relocated to Atlanta, cofounded their production company and got to work.
On Friday, their film, now named “Along Came the Devil,” will open at select theaters including the Plaza Theater in Midtown, as well as release to video on demand and digital HD.
Billed as “an exorcism for a new generation,” the film stars Sydney Sweeney (“Handmaid’s Tale”) as Ashley, a teen who is sent to live with her estranged aunt Tanya ( Jessica Barth of “Ted,” “Ted 2”). Upon returning to her hometown, Ashley begins having visions of her deceased mom but when she and a friend try to make contact with the spirit world they invite in demonic forces that threaten everyone around them.
For the DeVans, making the film has meant three years of grit, grace and hard lessons which they had the pleasure of enduring in the area where Heather, a native of Lilburn, was born and raised.
“We wanted to come home for a little while,” said Heather. We knew it would take a village…and we wanted to surround ourselves with loved ones.”
Filmed on location at Lake Lanier, Flowery Branch and Buford, the film is Jason DeVan’s twist on the many horror films he watched in college while working as a clerk in a video store.
Heather met Jason when she was 21, the year she moved to Los Angeles to pursue acting and he made her watch every horror movie known to mankind, she said.
After more than two decades in the industry, they knew it wouldn’t be easy to make their first film. Jason gave his elevator pitch to anyone who would listen. The duo kept at it until they found someone who believed in their project as much as they did.
As director, Jason had a near complete vision of how he wanted to execute the story inspired by a Brazilian family who had experienced demonic possession.
“I was such a big fan of The Exorcist,’” said Jason DeVan noting that films about exorcisms often follow a similar formula. “We wanted to leave the audience with the feeling that they haven’t seen that before. I wanted to leave them trying to piece it all together in their minds.”
Already the DeVans are at work on their next project — a psychological thriller about a child kidnapped first by his father then by a serial killer — and they have carried the most important lesson they’ve learned with them.
“Listen to our gut,” said Heather DeVan.