A Gary story is back in the headlines thanks to a new movie, and it offers a mixture of reviews from longtime residents of the community. 

The Deliverance, a new Lee Daniels film on Netflix, follows the story of Ebony Jackson (played by Andra Day) as she moves into a new home with her three children and mother (Glenn Close) as they try to start a new beginning in a new location. 

As she tries to clean her act up, Jackson, both literally and figuratively, must face her demons to keep her family safe. Based on actual events, the movie depicts several instances that Latoya Ammons spoke about in her 2014 article with the Indianapolis Star. 

Almost a decade since the “The Exorcisms of Latoya Ammons” article was released, this movie brings to light things that the family experienced at the “demon house”.

What is Latoya Ammons’ story?

In November 2011, Latoya Ammons, her mother Rosa Campbell, and Ammons’ three children moved into a rental home at 3860 Carolina St. on the east side of Gary. Almost immediately, strange occurrences began unsettling the family.

Despite the chilly weather, black flies swarmed their porch and persistently returned no matter how many were killed. The adults reported hearing footsteps echoing through the house, including the sound of someone walking up the basement stairs and opening the kitchen door. Campbell said she once woke up to see a shadowy figure of a man pacing in the living room, leaving behind large, wet boot prints. In another instance, the women said they walked into the 12-year-old daughter’s room and found her unconscious, levitating above her bed.

From there, things escalated. Ammon stated demons were possessing her and her three children.

She described her children — ages 7, 9, and 12 at the time — as having bulging eyes, faces contorted into evil smiles, and speaking in unnaturally deep voices that shocked her. Her youngest would sit in a closet and talk to a boy no one else could see, who described what it was like to be killed. Her daughter recounted feeling unable to speak or move because she felt like she was being choked or held down, or hearing voices that would tell her she’d never see her family again and would die soon. 

At first, officials thought the situation was bizarre and, at times, delusional. They thought Ammons was mentally ill and was encouraging her children to act like this. The boys spoke in demonic voices and lashed out at the family physician. At one point, they were transferred to Methodist Hospital in Gary, where it took five men to restrain the youngest as he thrashed violently.

This led to a case with the Indiana Department of Child Services opening and logging everything that happened, especially as the family was experiencing effects even outside the home. 

A DCS officer reported witnessing the youngest child growling, eyes rolling back, as he tried to choke his older brother until adults intervened. Later that evening, the 7-year-old told his brother, “It’s time to die” and “I will kill you” in an unnatural voice. As the grandmother prayed while holding his hands, the older boy headbutted her in the stomach.

The children were then taken into protective custody, with the report citing “spiritual and emotional distress.”

Devoted to her faith, Ammons and her mother tried to speak with several churches and spiritually guided people to help with the problem. She found the Rev. Mike Maginot  to do an exorcism on her and her family.

In June 2012, he performed three exorcisms — two in English and the last in Latin. Before the exorcisms, Ammons and her mother had moved with a family relative in Indianapolis as she tried to get custody back and balance what was going on in the house. Several months later, Ammons received custody of her children before moving to Indianapolis. 

In 2014, paranormal investigator Zak Bagans purchased the house for $35,000. He demolished the home in 2016 but released the documentary Demon House in 2018, which explored Ammons’ experiences from his perspective.

How similar is the story of Deliverance to the truth?

In an interview with the Hollywood Reporter, Daniels described his film as a “faith-based thriller,” based on his interpretation of Ammons’ life story. 

“The story sort of sat with me for forever,” Daniels said. “We had never seen this story, through this lens of this African American woman, onscreen, and I just felt we’re in such dark times, and I don’t think people really know how dark of times we are in. And I felt like I needed to get reconnected to my higher power.”

While he wanted to tell this story, he wanted to do it in his own way, which led him to change a few things.

One major change was the film’s location. Instead of Gary, where the real events took place, Daniels had the family move to Pittsburgh from Philadelphia. He also recast the mother as a white, born-again Christian, played by Glenn Close, who struggles with her relationship with her daughter.

“I made her mother white because I have so many mixed-race friends, and [I wanted to talk about] what it’s like to have a white mother and live in a Black girl’s body,” Daniels said.

Another significant change was the gender and race of the exorcist. In the film, a Black woman performs the exorcism, a departure from Maginot, the white male priest who helped Ammons.

“There are so many women that do this work, too, that don’t get recognized, so I changed that a little bit,” Daniels said. “I really wanted to separate as much as I could so I could make it my own story.”

What does the community think?

Since The Deliverance came out last week, reviews have been mixed for the film, especially here in Gary. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film got a 34% approval rating, and IMDb gave a rating of 5.1 out of 10.

Gary native Britanie Buggs called the film “very theatrical.” 

“I felt like they dramatized it, and they kind of tried to make it more about social problems, more so than a real possession issue,” she said. 

While she wasn’t in the city when the Ammons event was happening, she still remembers chatter from people that she knew. She enjoyed seeing how the actors interpreted the story, even if they focused on Ebony’s struggle with alcoholism and abuse and maintaining custody of her children.

For her, one thing that perturbed her about the movie was their choice to move the story from Gary to Pittsburgh, another steel city. Buggs said it didn’t feel right to her that the film was not in the local community. 

“Focusing on the reality of it is, I think, what makes it scary,” she explained, reflecting on why the retelling of the story could have been approached differently. “The closer you stay to the truth, the more real this film would have been and the more real it is, the scarier it is.”

On the other hand, Bionca Tate, another Gary native, loved the film. 

“I knew it was not a documentary or exactly Ms. Ammons’ story, but it was interesting in [what] they added,” she said.

Similar to Buggs, she remembers hearing talk and reading news articles about the events when they happened. She even discovered a personal connection to the story — the original homeowner’s wife was her school guidance counselor. 

Like many who watched online, she was curious about how the movie would handle religion, especially in the Black community. 

“I believe a higher power can get rid of a lower power,” she said, referring to how religion was portrayed in the film. 

While she was shocked that the film was not set in Gary, she states that she doesn’t think that took away from the story, as a “demon house” could be anywhere. 

“I hope people just take a look at the movie and watch it for what it is,” Tate said.