No sooner has his Faustian pact been made than his wife starts to become

No sooner has his Faustian pact been made than his wife starts to become unhinged and untold problems emerge. And the stigmata can be caught from objects, as if they were germs. Not surprisingly, the Catholic Church in America has condemned it as rubbish.But nobody is criticising Hollywood for a lack of enthusiasm for its subject.This latest revival of the "devil" genre kicked off last year with The Devil's Advocate, in which Al Pacino played a New York lawyer named John Milton who is in fact Satan on a mission to corrupt the mortal soul of Keanu Reeves.This was evil battling against good in more traditional form - the Reeves character, a young lawyer called Kevin Lomax, is tempted by a wonderful job and fabulous riches. The film's images and special effects are suitably powerful - monsters rise from the rubble of churches and blood has no problem bursting into flames. In Stigmata, which was number one at the American box office in the summer, Byrne shows up again, this time as an agent of the Vatican investigating a wave of demonic possessions. The stigmata of the title are depicted as terrible lacerations from Hell rather than signs of religious transcendence.

Like End of Days, it is full of devilish images, weird visions and mutilations, but plainly has a weak theological base. The social service does not use a special vehicle to ferry around families.. AT THE close of the old millennium and the dawn of the new, the Devil is stalking the Earth. At least, he features prominently in a cluster of new American films that portray Lucifer at large, generally in pursuit of the souls of the good and frequently planning to bring about the end of time. In the action film End of Days, the Devil, played as a businessman in an overcoat by Gabriel Byrne, is seeking a woman with whom to copulate before the end of the millennium Only Arnold Schwarzenegger stands in his way. "We will be offering support and counselling to the mother and the serving child," added Mr Kemp.He said that according to the council's records, the mother and her children had not previously been referred to the social services or contacted them for help.He said it was standard practice for the police to request places in refuges in cases of alleged domestic violence, but because his staff were so busy at this time of year there were no drivers available to pick the family up from the police station in Bishop Auckland. "I think there was some alleged domestic violence involving her partner," he said.A bed was located at a women's refuge in Consett but the social services did not have a car available to transfer the family so the police offered to take them instead.

A police spokesman did not know whether the family in the police car were wearing seat belts at the time of the crash.The spokesman added: "Early indications suggest that the Renault, which was travelling south, skidded and collided with the police panda, which was on its correct side of the road and travelling in the opposite direction."Peter Kemp, the director of Durham social services, said that his department was contacted by the police yesterday morning and asked to find a place in a shelter for the woman. Police have set up an investigation into the incident and will release details of the family after next-of- kin had been told. A couple and their two-year-old son who were travelling in a hired car that was also involved in the crash escaped uninjured.The A68, one of the main routes into Scotland, was closed for five hours while the vehicles were moved. A police spokesman said that the panda car was involved in a collision with a Renault travelling in the opposite direction, which appeared to have skidded over the central lines. A husband and wife who were in the Renault escaped uninjured but their 18-month-old son may have broken his leg and has head injuries, although they are not thought to be life-threatening. The officer who was driving the panda car was trapped in the wreckage and had to be cut from the vehicle by fire-fighters, but was not seriously injured.The accident happened after the police and Durham social service staff agreed to move a mother and her three young children to a refuge after complaints that her partner had become violent.The family was being driven the 12 miles from their home town of Bishop Auckland to Consett when the crash happened.