THE POSSESSION OF JOEL DELANEY

Norah Benson, an upperclass Manhattan divorcee, lives with her children, Peter and Carrie. She also has a younger adult brother, Joel Delaney, who has recently returned to New York after an extended visit to Tangier. She invites him to a reunion dinner at her home, but he fails to show. Concerned, Norah goes to Joel's East Village apartment, where she witnesses his being taken by police to the psychiatric ward of Bellevue Hospital. He has been accused of attacking his building superintendent. However, Joel is unable to recall the episode. At Norah's urging, Joel lies to the doctors, claiming he had taken hallucinogens. He is discharged on provision that he meet with a psychiatrist. Norah arranges an appointment for him with her friend Erika, who has actually known Joel most of his life. During their sessions, Joel recounts his close friendship with an ex-roommate named Tonio Perez. Meanwhile, Norah, having asked Joel to move in with her and the kids, observes his increasingly odd behavior: He asks Norah inappropriate questions about her sex life. Later, at his birthday party, he exhibits manic behavior, culminating in a series of crude insults to Norah's Puerto Rican maid, Veronica, which he relays in Spanish.

The following day, Norah visits the apartment of Joel's girlfriend, Sherry. Upon entering, she finds Sherry's decapitated corpse lying on her bed, and her severed head hanging from a houseplant. Police interview Norah and remark that Sherry's murder resembles serial killings that occurred the summer before in Spanish Harlem. They received little publicity since the victims were all Hispanic females. Detectives presume the perpetrator to be Tonio, who has been missing for several months, but his family and friends refuse to cooperate with authorities. With Veronica's help, Norah meets Don Pedro, a Santería practitioner in Harlem who arranges a ceremony to exorcise Tonio's spirit, which he believes has possessed Joel's body. In attendance is Tonio's grief-stricken mother, who admits to Norah that Tonio was in fact a serial murderer, and that when his father discovered this, he killed Tonio himself and disposed of his remains. Don Pedro concludes the ceremony is unsuccessful due to Norah's agnosticism toward the supernatural.

Norah returns home to find Joel screaming hysterically in Spanish. Frightened for her children's safety, she brings them to the family's beachfront vacation home in Long Island, while Erika promises to help Joel. The next morning, after returning from a walk on the beach, Norah finds Erika's severed head in the kitchen, and Joel standing nearby with his switchblade. Now uniformly possessed by Tonio, Joel torments and taunts Norah and the children. When the police arrive, Joel forces Peter to strip and dance naked on a table. He then forces Carrie to eat dog food, cutting her on the neck when she resists. An enraged Norah tries to stop him, but Joel brutally beats her before kissing her passionately. The children escape the house, and Joel runs after them. As a result, he is fatally shot by police. As Joel dies in Norah's arms, her behavior suddenly becomes emotionally distant. She then picks up Joel's switchblade and brandishes it menacingly at the police.

Joel, fully possessed by Tonio’s spirit, terrorizes Norah and her children in their Long Island home, culminating in violence and psychological torture before the children manage to escape.

The film’s conclusion underscores the futility of rational explanations in the face of supernatural evil, as Norah’s attempts to protect her family and find logical solutions are ultimately overwhelmed by forces beyond her understanding. The ending serves as both a cautionary tale about the limits of privilege and reason, and a bleak meditation on the persistence of trauma and violence—spiritual and otherwise—across social boundaries.