I’m looking for a movie where a stranger comes to a small town and persuades the citizens to do evil things to each other. Probably from the 80s or 90s. As far as I can remember the following items apply:
– it is implied that the stranger is the devil himself
– he gets the citizens to do small favors for him as a kind of quid-pro-quo, each deed seems innocuous, but combined they serve to incite violence
– the title might be something similar to (or words to that effect) “The little bad things” (but that might be a false memory)
– I can’t remember if it falls in the horror or the dark humor genre
Something Wicked This Way Comes (1983)?
Needful Things (1993)
This sounds like a Stephen King story that was made as a movie for TV called Needful Things. It had a sinister antiques dealer (played by Max von Sydow, and also had Ed Harris and Bonnie Bedelia. He would convince customers who wanted a special antique to do bad things. He was the Devil, and it was made from King’s novel of the same name. Hope this is it.
Could also be the TV miniseries “Storm of the Century,” also by Stephen King.