Exorcisms Outside Hollywood, Legit or Signs of Mental Illness?

Hollywood loves a good exorcism movie, but real people all across the world sometimes claim they are possessed by demons … and there’s real questions surrounding the authenticity of exorcisms.

TMZ Studios has a new series, “Strange & Suspicious,” now airing on a dozen FOX stations, where we explore strange, unexplained and downright weird stories, and now we’re looking into the validity of exorcisms.

Take Anneliese Michel in Germany for example … she was allegedly possessed by a demon, who claimed they had a right to use her body until she “croaked.”

While lots of exorcisms go down in private — far away from the big screen and Hollywood scripts — there are some that happen in church, often on camera.

Some of these more public exorcisms do seem a little performative … which raises the question, are these folks really possessed or just suffering from mental illness?!?

There are other possible explanations too, some based on science or medicine … but Anneliese feels more legit than others, and they’re all pretty scary.

So, what’s the deal here???