Devil’s Due is a musty and Satanic relic from 1973, sitting at the humid intersection where the Golden Age of Adult meets the post-Rosemary’s Baby possession explosion. This isn’t just a skin flick; it’s a mood piece dripping with the era’s specific brand of occult grime. It feels like a film shot in a basement that hasn’t been aired out since the LeVay era began.

The film stars Cindy West as a woman caught in the web of a local coven. While many films of this era used the Satanic cult angle as a thin excuse for low-budget ritual scenes, Devil’s Due leans into the psychological dread of bodily autonomy—or the lack thereof.

Cindy is not having a good day. In fact, she’s having one of the worst first acts in grindhouse history. She’s been drugged and assaulted by Dean Carlson (John Buco), an act of violation that leaves her pregnant. Seeking some semblance of sanctuary, she runs to her mechanic boyfriend, Willie Joe (played by Davey Jones — no, not that one). After a desperate attempt at connection, she tells him he’s the father, only for Willie Joe to dump her on the spot with the coldness of a blown head gasket.

Driven to the edge, she seeks out the only man who has never let her down: her father. Instead of paternal comfort, she finds him balls-deep in her best friend, Barbie (Lisa Grant). The betrayal is so visceral, so absolute, that Cindy screams until she physically breaks. She suffers a miscarriage and literally loses her voice, a heavy-handed but effective metaphor for a woman completely silenced by the men in her life.

Cindy runs again, this time to the big city, where she moves in with Dawn (Before she was “More, More, More”-ing her way onto the disco charts, Andrea True was a staple of these gritty New York productions. She brings a certain star power to the screen, elevating the material. and Nicky (Darby Lloyd Rains), two lesbians who say that she’s the best thing that ever happened to them.

The film wouldn’t have this title if it weren’t for Kampala (Gus Thomas) and his sex cult. In a bizarre twist of “where are they now,” Thomas would eventually leave the world of ritualistic smut to become Mark Suben, the District Attorney of Cortland, New York.

Having been burned by every man she’s ever known, Cindy sees right through Kampala’s mystical posturing. The film takes a sharp turn into a proto-feminist revenge flick as the girls conspire to hijack the cult from within. The cast list here is a “Who’s Who” of 70s adult legends, including Jamie Gillis, Marc Stevens, Georgina Spelvin (the same year she changed the game in The Devil in Miss Jones) and Tina Russell.

This movie rewards us with dialogue like,  “You may find this kind of strange, Cindy, but I work for the Devil!” and “You must kiss the cock of Satan!” Also: Death by poisoned nipples.

Directed by Ernest Danna and written by Gerry Pound, Devil’s Due is heavily influenced by the hyper-stylized Church of Satan photo layouts that haunted the pages of Men’s Digest and Knight magazines in the early 70s. It’s obsessed with the aesthetics of the Black Mass with lots of candles, heavy eyeliner, and a pervasive sense of spiritual decay.

You can watch this on Cultpix.