Category Archives: demonic possession movies

SMILE (2022) – Decent Horror Movie Provides Some First-Half Scares

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Yes, smiles can be creepy.

And SMILE (2022), a new horror movie now playing in theaters, takes full advantage of that fact. For two thirds of its running time, it delivers some genuine scares and a very interesting premise, before it falls off a bit with some over-the-top and unintentionally laughable special effects and a plot in which its characters seem to figure things out long after the audience does.

For while, SMILE reminded me somewhat of a better horror movie from a few years back, IT FOLLOWS (2014) as both movies had a creative and rather unique plot. In IT FOLLOWS, in what served as an allegory for the transmission of stds, the supernatural threat was passed on from person to person through sexual contact. The entity in IT FOLLOWS would slowly follow its victims, a relentless pursuit which would only end in either the victim dying, or, if the victim had sex with someone, then the entity would be passed on to that person and would stalk them.

Here in SMILE, the entity feeds off trauma, and it stalks its victims through suicide. Each victim, who sees random and oftentimes people they know smiling at them strangely, are driven to commit suicide, and the person who witnesses the suicide is the next to be stalked. The difference between the two movies is that in IT FOLLOWS, the teenage characters aggressively attempted to fight back and figure out ways to stop the supernatural stalker, whereas here in SMILE, it takes forever for the characters to figure out what’s going on, and when they do, for some strange reason, they fail to act on it.

In SMILE, Dr. Rose Cotter (Sosie Bacon) treats a young woman who insists she’s not crazy, that she is being stalked by a real creature that appears like ordinary human beings only with a sadistic smile. While Rose tries to treat her, the woman suddenly shrieks that the creature is in the room with them, and she brutally slits her own throat.

A short time later, Rose begins to experience the same symptoms, having bizarre and frightening hallucinations of people she knows smiling threateningly at her. To make matters more complicated, when Rose was a child she witnessed her abusive mother commit suicide, so when Rose begins to act unhinged, her sister, her fiancé, her boss, all believe it’s the result of childhood trauma. The only person who does believe her is her cop ex-boyfriend, Joel (Kyle Gallner), and he helps her investigate the strange goings on, and they discover a trail going back a long time of suicide victims who were witnesses to other suicides. Rose then uses this information to fight for her life.

For a while, SMILE was firing on all cylinders. I was enjoying the story, which had a premise I found rather interesting, and the scares were there. Early on, there were some frightening scenes, spots where I actually jumped.

But when Rose finally figures out what is going on, and it becomes clear that the supernatural entity goes from one body to another after its current host’s suicide is witnessed by someone else, the story takes a hit because you expect Rose to realize this and make it her strategy to isolate herself, to get away from any other people in order to strip the creature of its calling card, but by the time she decides to do this, it’s way too late.

Plus, the film makes the dubious decision to include some over-the-top gross out effects which seem like they jumped off the set of a Tim Burton movie. Members of the audience actually laughed at these effects, which I’m sure wasn’t the intention.

Writer/director Parker Finn has written an intriguing horror tale but unfortunately his main characters suffer through a major case of the stupids and don’t figure things out until long after those of us sitting in the audience have done so. He does craft some frightening scenes early on, and I liked this, but the film doesn’t hold it together for its entirety, slowing down and becoming much less frightening as it closes in on its end credits.

SMILE is an okay horror movie that provides some decent scares for this Halloween season, even though in its latter half there isn’t all that much to smile about.

I give it two and a half stars.

—END—

RATING SYSTEM

Four stars- Excellent

Three stars- Very Good

Two stars- Fair

One star- Poor

Zero Stars- Awful

MALIGNANT (2021) – James Wan Knows How To Make a Horror Movie But His Latest is Uneven

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MALIGNANT (2021), the latest horror movie by director/writer James Wan, the man who brought us SAW (2003), INSIDIOUS (2010) and THE CONJURING (2013), opens with a campy pre-credit sequence that’s an obvious nod to RE-ANIMATOR (1985) but then pivots into a slick action horror movie that gets better as it goes along until it stumbles with a weak conclusion.

I’m not a fan of RE-ANIMATOR (gasp!) so the ridiculous over-the-top pre-credit sequence with its laughable dialogue nearly turned me off to the point where I almost turned the movie off. But I stuck with it, and I’m glad I did, because for the most part I enjoyed all that followed.

MALIGNANT opens with a pre-credit sequence set in the 1990s at a medical facility where a patient who seems to feed off electricity is going haywire attacking everyone, and the doctors are struggling to control him. Finally an exasperated Dr. Florence Weaver (Jacqueline McKenzie) cries out that it’s time to cut out the cancer, and at the moment the title credits begin.

The action switches to present day where a pregnant Madison Mitchell (Annabelle Wallis) is struck hard by her abusive husband Derek (Jake Abel). She locks the door to their bedroom, and Derek spends the night on the couch. He is awoken by some strange noises in the house, and as he investigates, electrical appliances turn on and off. A demon-like figure emerges and attacks and kills Derek. The next day Madison discovers her husband’s dead body, and then she is attacked by the mysterious demon-figure as well, but she manages to escape.

When the police investigate, the two detectives Shaw (George Young) and Moss (Michole Briana White) upon learning that there are no signs of forced entry, and that Derek used to beat Madison, consider Madison their primary suspect. Later, when a prominent doctor is murdered and Madison sees the murder as if she is there in the room, she goes to Shaw and Moss along with her younger sister Sydney (Maddie Hasson) with this information, which to the detectives seems farfetched and only fuels their suspicions of Madison. The mystery deepens when they discover that when Madison was a child she was once treated by the murdered doctor, a time that Madison can’t remember, as the years before she was adopted by Sydney’s parents are all blank.

The investigation continues, as do the murders, and the victims are all doctors who worked at the facility where Madison had once been treated.

As stories go, the one told in MALIGNANT is actually really good. While the big twist at the end is fairly obvious, I liked the fact that this one told a story that wasn’t about your typical demon or devil. The hints are all there, and at times it seems like this one may go that route, but it doesn’t. So, the story was fresh, and the mystery compelling. And while you may see the big reveal coming ahead of time, it still makes for quite the shocking revelation. It’s the kind of scene that I could easily see generating lots of screams and gasps from a crowded theater audience.

So the screenplay by Akela Cooper, based on a story by James Wan and Ingrid Bisu, scores high marks for its innovative plot. It does struggle with dialogue at times. The campy dialogue in the film’s pre-credit sequence is laughable, and while that may have been on purpose, it doesn’t really fit here, since the rest of the movie isn’t campy at all. And some of the lines during the film’s conclusion are just flat out bad, pure and simple.

Also the police in this movie aren’t very smart. Most of the answers to the mysteries in MALIGNANT are discovered by Madison’s sister Sydney. Detectives Shaw and Moss don’t seem to know how to follow leads and often make decisions that seem foolish.

Akela Cooper was also one of the screenwriters who wrote the horror movie HELL FEST (2018), a film about a masked killer terrorizing a Halloween-themed amusement park that I liked a lot. Interestingly, HELL FEST shares a similar problem with MALIGNANT in that it also had an opening sequence that was badly written but it… just like MALIGNANT— got much better. Hmm, maybe Cooper has something against opening sequences!

The best part of MALIGNANT is the work of director James Wan. He’s at the top of his game here. The film looks fantastic and is visually superior. There are many haunting scenes, the murders are violent and gory, the mysterious murderer is frightening and weird, and there are some excellent action scenes here as well. The chase scene where Detective Shaw pursues the murderer on foot is right out of a James Bond movie. Visually, MALIGNANT is a horror movie treat.

While I’m not a fan of SAW, I loved both INSIDIOUS and THE CONJURING, and while both those movies are scarier than MALIGNANT, their demon stories aren’t as fresh as the one told here in this movie.

I’ve been a fan of Annabelle Wallis since her days on the TV show PEAKY BLINDERS (2013-2019). She also starred in ANNABELLE (2014) and ANNABELLE: CREATION (2017), as well as in the Tom Cruise version of THE MUMMY (2017), a film I wish I could forget I ever saw. Wallis is solid here as Madison, who for large chunks of this movie is either frightened or in a dreamlike state forced to watch grisly murders. She eventually rises up to become a heroine.

George Young is also very good as Detective Shaw, and as previously stated, he gets one of the best sequences in the film, as he chases the murderer down a treacherous fire escape into the dark streets of underground Seattle.

Speaking of underground Seattle, the plot point in MALIGNANT where the killer hides in those forgotten streets reminded me of another horror classic, THE NIGHT STRANGLER (1973), the sequel to THE NIGHT STALKER (1972) and the second time we got to see Darren McGavin play reporter Carl Kolchak. The killer in THE NIGHT STRANGLER also resided in underground Seattle.

MALIGNANT also sports another energetic and effective music score by Joseph Bishara.

While overall I enjoyed MALIGNANT, taken as a whole, it’s a bit uneven for me. After its out of place campy opening, it gets better, and the bulk of this film is really well done. But it doesn’t end strong, as its conclusion isn’t all that believable, and as a result, I found the final reel disappointing.

Still, James Wan knows how to make a horror movie, and for that reason alone, I recommend MALIGNANT, even though it doesn’t entirely work for me.

—END—

IN THE SPOOKLIGHT: THE WIND (2018)

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It’s just the wind.

How many times have we heard that line before? In this case, it’s true.

Or is it?

I hadn’t heard much about THE WIND (2018), a slow burn horror flick which takes places in the 1800s western frontier, when I stumbled upon it on Netflix, so I had no idea what to expect. Usually when I pick a movie I haven’t heard of, I am disappointed. That wasn’t the case this time around. THE WIND is an exceptional horror movie.

Let me tell you about it.

THE WIND is a thinking person’s horror film, and its persistent low key style is similar to some other recent horror films, flicks like THE BABADOOK (2014), THE WITCH (2015), HEREDITARY (2018), and MIDSOMMAR (2019). Now, THE WIND wasn’t quite as disturbing as these other movies, but that didn’t stop it from getting under my skin, which it did, in the most subtle and effective of ways.

In the late 1800s, married couple Lizzy (Caitlin Gerard) and Isaac Macklin (Ashley Zukerman) live in their modest farmhouse in the middle of nowhere. They have no neighbors until another young couple move into a cabin across the way, Emma (Julia Goldani Telles) and Gideon Harper (Dylan McTee). When Lizzy and Isaac invite them over, they immediately realize there is something off about the couple.

What follows is an intriguing tale which through the use of flashbacks jumps back and forth in time and chronicles the efforts of an unseen demon in the wilderness which primarily seems to affect the women. Lizzy definitely is aware of some force haunting them, but Isaac tells her it is just her imagination. This demon wants to force them off the land and also has a keen interest in their unborn children. This combined with Emma’s eccentric behavior and unusual interest in Isaac creates a wedge between the two women and complicates the couples’ relationships, while seemingly fueling the demon’s actions. And it all leads to violence, bloodshed, and death.

By far, my favorite part of THE WIND was the way it was shot by director Emma Tammi. The cinematography is absolutely beautiful, and there are some truly hauntingly framed scenes which really resonate. THE WIND may not be scary, but it is so, so haunting, which is exactly the way a slow burn horror movie should be.

The screenplay by Teresa Sutherland is smart and effective. The way it frames its story…is it really a demon? Or is it just inside Emma’s mind?… works well, as it keeps the audience guessing all the way down to the final shot of the movie. The dialogue is lean and efficient. There are lots of spots in the film where no one talks. Where you just hear the wind. The film also uses sound winningly. The wind becomes a character in the movie just by our hearing it.

Caitlin Gerard is excellent in the lead role as Lizzy Macklin. She exudes strength and endurance and is the perfect character to suddenly find herself facing a demon in the wilderness. And later when doubts begin to seep in, when one begins to wonder if it really is just Lizzy’s mind playing tricks on her, Gerard is more than up to the task of capturing the self-doubts the woman endures. It’s a mesmerizing performance by Gerard. She really does bring the audience inside Lizzy’s head, making you feel like you too are alone on the prairie, hearing and seeing strange things in the wind in the middle of the night.

Ashley Zukerman is stoic and strong as Lizzy’s husband Isaac. For the most part, Isaac is there for his wife and supports her, except when he leaves her alone for an extended period of time to conduct some business. While he’s gone, the film really plays up Lizzy’s feelings of isolation.

Julia Goldani Telles is cold and weird as Emma Harper. She is certainly the creepiest human character in the movie. There’s just something about her personality that’s off putting and gets under one’s skin, like the entire movie does.

Dylan McTee plays Emma’s husband Gideon, and he’s also an odd one. And Miles Anderson makes his mark in a small role as a travelling reverend.

All in all, THE WIND is a satisfying low key thriller that takes its time unsettling its audience. It tells a tale of isolation, horror, and maybe even madness, as one woman squares off against haunting forces which seem to everyone but herself to be simply sounds in the wind.

—END–

THE CONJURING: THE DEVIL MADE ME DO IT (2021) – Third Film in Series Plays Like It

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Back in 2013, director James Wan made THE CONJURING, a horror film I liked a lot, although I liked his previous horror flick INSIDIOUS (2010) even more. THE CONJURING was a huge success and spawned a sequel and then an entire “universe” comprised of films telling the stories of the various demons in these movies, most notably the devil doll Annabelle. Some of these films have been good, and a lot of them have been not so good. None have been as strong as the first CONJURING movie.

Now comes the second direct sequel to the original, THE CONJURING: THE DEVIL MADE ME DO IT (2021), which in spite of its laughable title, isn’t half bad. Which means it isn’t half good either.

THE CONJURING: THE DEVIL MADE ME DO IT tells the further adventures of demon hunters Ed (Patrick Wilson) and Lorraine Warren (Vera Farmiga) as they take on another case of demonic possession and murder. Ed and Lorraine Warren were real people, most famous for their involvement with the infamous Amityville Horror case. And these movies take full advantage of that fact, always ominously declaring “based on a true story.”

Although this is the third film in the CONJURING series, this is the fourth time Wilson and Farmiga have played these roles, as they appeared in the very weak ANNABELLE COMES HOME (2019), the third film in that spinoff series!

THE CONJURING: THE DEVIL MADE ME DO IT opens with…you got it!… an exorcism scene! Ed and Lorraine Warren are helping a family exorcise an evil spirit from the body of their young son. However, the demon is none too happy about leaving… are they ever? You’d think some of these demons would learn the art of subtlety. You know, mess around a bit here and there, have some fun, but never call attention to themselves. They could have a long and happy life inside their host bodies. Anyway, that’s not how the demons in these movies roll.

The boyfriend of the boy’s older sister, Arne (Ruairi O’Connor), decides to play the hero and calls the demon into his own body, and the demon obliges. Later, when Arne kills a man and is arrested for murder, Ed and Lorraine come to his defense, claiming that he is possessed. However, their “tests” on him reveal that he’s not possessed, which confuses them since they know the demon jumped bodies and entered Arne. So, they realize that they are now dealing with something entirely different from anything they had encountered before. Oooh! Scary!!! They decide to investigate further, promising Arne that they will help him, and as they search for clues, they discover that Arne is the victim of… drum roll please…. a curse!

Curses!

Now it’s up to Ed and Lorraine to figure out just who has cursed the young man, and what this means for them because the source of the curse is none too happy about being investigated and is more than ready to strike back and inflict some harm on the Warrens!

As horror stories go, the one told in THE CONJURING: THE DEVIL MADE ME DO IT isn’t bad. I liked following Ed and Lorraine on their investigation, and the story builds up some suspense as it goes along, and it was enough to keep me interested. And both Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga are solid in their roles, as they always are, and so this helps as well.

But the biggest problem I had with this third CONJURING movie, and it’s the same problem I have with all the films in this “universe” other than the first one, is that little or no effort is made to make the story being told believable. Other than the “based on a true story” tagline, there’s nothing resembling truth here. Take the opening exorcism scene, for instance. The gold standard for exorcism scenes remains the climactic exorcism in THE EXORCIST (1973). And while that scene did exhibit Hollywood special effects, it worked, because it was built on a solid story, and by the time you reach that point in the movie, you are just so rattled that believability is not an issue. You’ll believe anything at that point. The filmmakers convinced you of it.

In the opening exorcism scene here, which also riffs on THE EXORCIST as the sequence showing the exorcist arriving at the house is exceedingly derivative of Max von Sydow’s arrival in THE EXORCIST, special effects spew out like a Disney theme ride…. although I have to give credit where credit is due. Supposedly they hired a contortionist to actually do the twisted body movements, so that’s pretty cool…but without any background or back story, we simply don’t care about these people, we have no idea what they’ve been through, or have any understanding of their plight, and so none of this lends to any semblance of believability.

Throughout the movie, the dialogue, as it is throughout this CONJURING/ANNABELLE universe, is phony and unrealistic. When Ed and Lorraine talk about demons so matter-of-factly, it sounds like a dated vampire movie. They make little attempt to convince people that what they are saying is true, and in these movies, they don’t have to since demons are more active than your local political party. When Ed and Lorraine speak, they sound crazy. No effort is made to convince the audience that, yes, this is farfetched, but it really happened. Nope. The message is, this is farfetched, it really happened, and you’ll just have to take our word for it.

Sorry. No can do.

The screenplay, then, by David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick, based on a story by James Wan, and on characters by Chad Hayes, constructs a surprisingly riveting story but drops the ball with the dialogue and authenticity. I didn’t believe in what was happening for a second. Johnson-McGoldrick has an impressive resume too. He wrote the screenplay for ORPHAN (2009), a horror film I liked a lot, and for RED RIDING HOOD (2011) a horror film which was widely panned but that I also liked a lot. But he also wrote the scripts for WRATH OF THE TITANS (2012), THE CONJURING 2 (2016), and AQUAMAN (2018), films I wasn’t so keen on.

Michael Chaves took over the directing duties from James Wan this time around and does a commendable job. While I wouldn’t categorize THE CONJURING: THE DEVIL MADE ME DO IT as scary, there are some effective and entertaining horror scenes, a couple in particular involving a reanimated hulking corpse. The film enjoys some fine visual moments.

Unfortunately it suffers from the “been there, done that” syndrome. In spite of the fact that Ed and Lorraine are now investigating a “curse” rather than a demonic possession, there really isn’t anything in this movie we haven’t seen before.

On the plus side, though, Joseph Bishara’s chilling music score adds quite a bit to the movie.

All in all, THE CONJURING: THE DEVIL MADE ME DO IT is a solid yet unremarkable entry in the CONJURING series. It will entertain fans and nonfans alike. It’s pretty much exactly what you would expect for a third film in a series.

Which is to say it doesn’t make any new inroads or impressions. It just rehashes previous themes and characterizations and manages to do so in a respectable fashion.

You don’t need the devil to make you watch this one. It’s halfway decent on its own.

—END—

Horror Movies: 2020

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Okay, here we go. Here’s my list of the horror movies I saw in 2020, from worst to first.

Enjoy!

THE BABYSITTER: KILLER QUEEN

14 THE BABYSITTER: KILLER QUEEN (2020) was by far the worst horror movie I saw this year. A pointless sequel to the superior original THE BABYSITER (2017). In spite of this being a horror comedy, this one is a snooze from start to finish.

13. THE TURNING

Turn this one off. Another clunker, this horror movie based on the Henry James’ novella “The Turn of the Screw,” and starring Mackenzie Davies and Finn Wolfhard, couldn’t turn a stomach, let alone a screw.

12. YOU SHOULD HAVE LEFT

Haunted house thriller starring Kevin Bacon and Amanda Seyfried is just standard. Offers no surprises.

11. HIS HOUSE

Netflix thriller about a refugee couple in a haunted house has its moments, but not enough of them to really make this worth your while.

THE DARK AND THE WICKED

10. THE DARK AND THE WICKED

Dark thriller about an adult sister and brother on a farm caring for their dying father who happens to be possessed is solidly made but suffers from the “you are all victims syndrome” in that none of the folks in this movie ever stand a chance. The dark wins. Easily.

9. RELIC

Intriguing tale of a mother and daughter caring for the daughter’s ailing grandmother who also seems to be possessed. Clever allegory about dementia doesn’t entirely work but it has its moments.

8. THE WRETCHED

Story of a witch living in the woods works because the main character, a teenage boy scarred by his parents’ divorce, feels empathy for his neighbors and decides to help them fend off the witch, but he has a troubled past, which gets in the way of his heroic efforts. Well-written horror flick.

7. WE SUMMON THE DARKNESS

Lively horror movie about three girlfriends who meet up with three guys at a rock concert as a serial killer is on the loose. Major plot twist takes this over-the top horror flick in an entirely different direction midway through. Takes place in the 1980s.

6. THE RENTAL

Alison Brie and Dan Stevens star in this effective thriller about two couples away for the weekend at a vacation home, very suspicious of the creepy sketchy owner. I liked this one.

5 #ALIVE

Stylish zombie thriller from South Korea is very entertaining even as it doesn’t really offer anything that is new to the zombie genre.

4. UNDERWATER

Fun underwater adventure starring Kristen Stewart . Far from perfect, but fun and suspenseful all the same.

3. ANTEBELLUM

I really liked this ambitious horror movie starring Janelle Monae about slaves on a Civil War era plantation run by sadistic Confederate soldiers. Jumps back and forth between the 1860s and modern times, and contains a VERY controversial plot twist that most fans hated. I didn’t like the twist, but I did like the movie. Powerful music score as well.

2. THE INVISIBLE MAN

Clever re-imagining of THE INVISIBLE MAN concept, stars Elizabeth Moss as a woman tormented by her supposedly deceased abusive husband. She thinks he’s invisible, her friends think she’s crazy. Works best as a psychologicial thriller. Plays its hand a bit too early, but still an above average horror movie.

SPUTNIK

  1. SPUTNIK

My favorite horror movie of 2020 is the tale of a Russian cosmonaut who returns to Earth harboring an alien creature inside his body. Oksana Akinshina steals the show as the psychologist brought in to study him. Superior horror film. Worthwhile viewing from start to finish.

And there you have it. The horror films I watched in 2020, from worst to first.

As always, thanks for reading!

—Michael

*

– *

THE DARK AND THE WICKED (2020) – Well-Made Horror Movie Devoid of Resilient Characters

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THE DARK AND THE WICKED (2020), a new horror movie by writer/director Bryan Bertino, is one of those horror movies that, while watching it, I enjoyed pretty much everything about it, and then it ends, and I’m left scratching my head asking, what was the point?

Did I really just spend 90 minutes watching the total destruction of a family on a farm? Yes. Why?

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not arguing that movies have to have happy endings, because they don’t, and I like dark endings just as much as the next guy. But sometimes, and this is a gray area with horror movies, there just isn’t enough there. In this case, the characters don’t stand a chance and barely fight back. There’s hardly a struggle. They’re pretty much helpless victims throughout. And that’s just not enough for me to make investing 90 minutes of my time worth it.

In THE DARK AND THE WICKED, Louise (Marin Ireland) and her brother Michael (Michael Abbott Jr.) return to their family’s rural farm to help their mother (Julie Oliver-Touchstone) care for their ailing father, who’s in a bed in a near comatose state. It doesn’t take them long to see that something is not quite right with their mother, as she seems more disturbed than usual. Michael chalks it up to the way she is dealing with their dad’s condition, while Louise isn’t so sure. But when they discover their mom’s body hanging in their barn, after she had chopped off her own fingers, they realize something is very wrong.

And that something, they learn, is some supernatural force, a demon or perhaps the devil, that has its sights set upon stealing the souls of everyone inside the farmhouse. And it’s something Louise and Michael have a difficult time wrapping their heads around, since they, and their parents, are not religious.

And that’s a major theme of the movie, that you don’t have to believe in the devil to be his victim. As one character in the movie says, you may not believe in wolves, but if one corners you, it doesn’t much matter what you believe.

Louise and Michael are then faced with a threat that neither of them understands, nor do they know how to stop it.

THE DARK AND THE WICKED is a well-made horror movie by writer/director Bryan Bertino. Visually, it is full of creepy scenes throughout, scenes that work, and successfully get under one’s skin. The screenplay is also very good, with realistic dialogue and characters.

So, why didn’t I love this one? It’s as I said, that the film focuses on the two main characters Louise and Michael, and all that slowly happens to them on the farm, and they were just a bit too helpless for my liking. By the time the end credits roll, you realize you’ve just watched a story about folks succumbing to the evil predatory force which had been stalking them. Game over. Souls consumed. Pass the devil a napkin.

That’s just not my thing.

The two main leads are very good. Marin Ireland as Louise is the character who comes closest to fighting back. She at least refuses to give in and tries to understand what is happening to her parents and her family. Ireland delivers a natural, realistic performance.

As does Michael Abbott Jr. as Michael, who is somewhat lesser effective as a character, as he remains pretty clueless throughout. He’s an easy target for the devil.

The rest of the cast is fine in small supporting roles. Xander Berkeley, who’s enjoyed a long career and recently was very memorable as Gregory on THE WALKING DEAD (2016-18), has some eerie moments as a mysterious priest.

While I didn’t love THE DARK AND THE WICKED, I did like it. Bryan Bertino has made a good looking and spooky horror movie that only suffers from a one-sided story. The forces of darkness dominate this one. The people are pretty much reduced to dinner menu items. I enjoyed Bertino’s previous horror movie, THE MONSTER (2016) a bit better. Bertino also wrote and directed the major theatrical release THE STRANGERS (2008), a horror movie that a lot of people liked, but I didn’t.

THE DARK AND THE WICKED is exactly what its title implies. If you’re looking for any signs of light, any hope for humanity, or for characters who rise up and fight back, you won’t find them here.

—END—-

WORST MOVIES 2019

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it chapter two

Here’s a look at my picks for the Ten Worst Movies of 2019:

10. PET SEMATARY

Coming in at #10 it’s PET SEMATARY, which is both an inferior remake of the 1989 movie and a pretty tepid take on one of Stephen King’s scariest novels. The changes made to King’s story here have potential but sadly the filmmakers do little with them. And as much as I like John Lithgow as an actor, he did not make me forget Fred Gwynne’s memorable performance as Jud Crandall in the 1989 film.

9. THE DEAD DON’T DIE

Fans of writer/director Jim Jarmusch seemed to really like this one, but for me, this zombie comedy just didn’t work. For starters, it had no sense of the genre, as its zombie/horror elements were weak and uninspired. In spite of an impressive cast which included Bill Murray and Adam Driver in lead roles, the deadpan breaking-the-fourth-wall humor I found obvious and mundane.

THE DEAD DON'T DIE

8. THE PRODIGY

One of the more forgettable horror movies of 2019. Another evil child chiller that offers nothing new.

7. ISN’T IT ROMANTIC

No. It isn’t. It’s not even that funny. This rom com starring Rebel Wilson as a cynical romantic who suddenly finds herself living in a romantic comedy can’t seem to move beyond its clever gimmick. While some of the humor works, most of it doesn’t, making for a lukewarm entry in the rom com genre.

6. IT CHAPTER TWO

This long, overblown, and slow-moving horror “epic” which clocks in at two hours and forty-nine minutes would have struggled to be scary even in half the time. Simply put, the main characters here were far more interesting when they were children, which is why part one of this flick was more entertaining. A waste of a good cast, as even the presence of James McAvoy and Jessica Chastain can’t save this one. Even worse than the incredibly long running time is how not scary Pennywise is in this movie. Based on Stephen King’s novel.

5. RAMBO: LAST BLOOD

Bottom of the barrel entry in the RAMBO series, this uninspired revenge flick is just that: Rambo exacts vengeance on thugs who abducted his niece. The ridiculous ending seems to be inspired by HOME ALONE (1990). The film makes no effort to lend credibility to the idea that Rambo at his advanced age could take down a gang of violent drug heavies singlehandedly.

rambo last blood stallone

4. ANNABELLE COMES HOME

Another awful horror movie from 2019.  In spite of the fact that Annabelle is one creepy doll, filmmakers continue to struggle to write worthwhile stories about her. This one wastes the talents of Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson, who show up only for the beginning and end. Someone should lock Annabelle in her glass case and throw away the key. The series just isn’t very good.

annabelle comes home

3. THE CURSE OF LA LLORONA

My pick for the worst horror movie of 2019. No surprise, this one also takes place in THE CONJURING/ANNABELLE universe, which simply put, is not the universe you want your horror movie to appear in. I loved the original THE CONJURING (2013). The ensuing movies just haven’t been very good. Here, we have a demon that preys on children, and a priest who does battle against it in scenes that are laughably bad.

2. COLD PURSUIT-

The Liam Neeson actioner may have worn out its welcome with this movie, in which Neeson plays a snowplow driver who seeks vengeance against the thugs who murdered his son. Blah, blah, blah. Been there. Done that. This one also makes some bizarre attempts at humor, with some over the top superimposed captions following each character’s violent demise. My least favorite Liam Neeson movie in quite some time.

1. THE LIGHTHOUSE

Yeah, I know. For some folks, this was their pick for the best movie of the year. And yes, I can’t take anything away from writer/director Robert Eggers’ masterful black and white cinematography. This might be the best made movie I’ve ever loathed so much. Photography looks awesome, but this tale of two lighthouse keepers, played by Robert Pattinson and Willem Dafoe, who become stranded there together for an extended period of time, and hence have to deal with each other, is a story of boredom and madness, and for me, it provoked just that. I wasn’t interested in either character, and watching them simply deal with each other over the course of this film was a maddening experience that left me completely bored. Story matters. Magnificent cinematography on its own does not a movie make. I often judge a movie by how soon I’d want to see it again. I never want to see THE LIGHTHOUSE again.

the lighthouse

Hence, it’s my pick for the worst movie of 2019.

And there you have it, my picks for the worst films of 2019.

As always, thanks for reading!

—Michael

Books by Michael Arruda:

DARK CORNERS, Michael Arruda’s second short story collection, contains ten tales of horror, six reprints and four stories original to this collection.

Dark Corners cover (1)

Waiting for you in Dark Corners are tales of vampires, monsters, werewolves, demonic circus animals, and eternal darkness. Be prepared to be both frightened and entertained. You never know what you will find lurking in dark corners.

Ebook: $3.99. Available at http://www.crossroadspress.com and at Amazon.com.  Print on demand version available at https://www.amazon.com/dp/1949914437.

TIME FRAME,  science fiction novel by Michael Arruda.  

How far would you go to save your family? Would you change the course of time? That’s the decision facing Adam Cabral in this mind-bending science fiction adventure by Michael Arruda.

Ebook version:  $2.99. Available at http://www.crossroadpress.com. Print version:  $18.00. Includes postage! Email your order request to mjarruda33@gmail.com. Also available at Amazon.com.

IN THE SPOOKLIGHT, movie review collection by Michael Arruda.

InTheSpooklight_NewText

Michael Arruda reviews horror movies throughout history, from the silent classics of the 1920s, Universal horror from the 1930s-40s, Hammer Films of the 1950s-70s, all the way through the instant classics of today. If you like to read about horror movies, this is the book for you!

 Ebook version:  $4.99.  Available at http://www.crossroadpress.com.  Print version:  $18.00.  Includes postage. Email your order request to mjarruda33@gmail.com. Also available at Amazon.com.

FOR THE LOVE OF HORROR, first short story collection by Michael Arruda.  

For_the_love_of_Horror- original cover

Print cover

For the Love of Horror cover (3)

Ebook cover

 

Michael Arruda’s first short story collection, featuring a wraparound story which links all the tales together, asks the question: can you have a relationship when your partner is surrounded by the supernatural? If you thought normal relationships were difficult, wait to you read about what the folks in these stories have to deal with. For the love of horror!

 Ebook version:  $4.99.  Available at http://www.crossroadpress.com. Print version:  $18.00.  Includes postage. Email your order request to mjarruda33@gmail.com. Also available at Amazon.com.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

COUNTDOWN (2019) – Tepid Horror Movie Offers Few Scares, Some Laughs

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countdown

COUNTDOWN (2019), the new horror movie about an app that predicts people’s death dates with deadly accuracy, is all over the place.

As such, it has some good moments, and a lot of not so good moments.

First off, COUNTDOWN is not a good horror movie. In fact, as horror movies go, it’s pretty bad. Strangely, when it works best is when it turns to comic relief, but at the end of the day, COUNTDOWN is not a comedy. It’s a horror movie, and as such, it just doesn’t work.

COUNTDOWN opens  with a group of teens as they discover a new app called “Countdown” which will give them their death dates. When one of the girls sees her death date within a few hours, she panics. She flees her boyfriend’s car because he’s been drinking, but she ends up dying anyway.

Later, her boyfriend, in the hospital because of injuries sustained in a car crash, sees that he too only has hours to live. He relays his fears to his nurse, Quinn Harris (Elizabeth Lail), and when he too dies, Quinn decides to check out the app for herself. And when Quinn sees that she too has only days to live, she— well, you get the idea. Anyway, since Quinn is the main character here, she decides she has to fight back and get to the bottom of this mystery before it gets her.

And that’s the plot of COUNTDOWN.

The biggest strike against COUNTDOWN is that it doesn’t make a lot of sense. Now,  these apps do exist in real life, so that’s not the problem, but the film’s leap of making the app deadly isn’t believable at all.  The screenplay by director Justin Dec attempts to give answers, but they’re not always clear.

Quinn intimates that the app is targeting certain people, as other people who download the app have death dates years in the future, but this isn’t supported in the movie. The app seems to be making accurate predictions. It only becomes deadly when the person learning of their death date attempts to cheat death.

Later, the story introduces a supernatural element that is supposed to make sense of it all, but it never really explains what the evil demon or devil is really doing. Is this entity controlling the app? Is the app itself evil? The film never really nails this down. Plus, once the supernatural is introduced, it all becomes very far-fetched and rather ridiculous.

The first half of the movie is particularly bad and very muddled. It gets a bit better when Quinn meets another man Matt Monroe (Jordan Calloway) whose life has also been threatened by the app. As soon as Matt enters the movie, things get better. He and Quinn share a real chemistry and for a brief while the story becomes rather interesting.

Their quest for answers also takes them to the comedic characters in the film, who provide the movie with its livelier moments. They seek out help at their local phone store and there meet an electronics guru named Derek (Tom Segura) who promises them he can delete the app from their phones. Derek is a quirky character who in spite of the fact that he’s played for laughs is one of the more interesting characters in the movie.

Their search for answers also takes them to a priest Father John (P.J. Byrne), a self-proclaimed demon expert. Father John is about as unconventional a demon hunter as you will find in a movie. As such, while his scenes are all rather light and humorous, they are also completely unrealistic. The film definitely sacrifices realism for laughs.

So, COUNTDOWN gets better for a little while before ultimately crawling towards a conclusion that simply is standard fare and nothing memorable.

There’s also a ridiculous sub plot involving a doctor, Dr. Sullivan (Peter Facinelli) who attempts to sexually assault Quinn and turns out to be a genuine creep. Unfortunately, these scenes come off as superficial and phony, an insult to the subject matter.

On the other hand, Talitha Bateman, who we saw a couple of years ago in ANNABELLE: CREATION (2017), enjoys some fine scenes as Quinn’s younger sister Jordan who also runs afoul of the app.

And Elizabeth Lail is very good in the lead role as nurse Quinn Harris. She’s just stuck in a bad movie. Likewise, Jordan Calloway is equally as good as Matt Monroe, and their scenes together are the best in the movie. Their performances even make you forget the ridiculousness of the plot. Unfortunately, Calloway isn’t in the movie all that much, and so the best parts of this one are fleeting. Had Lail and Calloway been in the entire movie together, the movie would have been much better.

And there are other problems as well.

The scares are practically nonexistent. In fact, I can’t remember any scenes here that were particularly scary or suspenseful. And sometimes these sequences were downright laughable.

For example, one of the goofiest parts of the movie is when the victims see a strange apparition following them, and this apparation looks like the Grim Reaper. I’m sorry, but I couldn’t take this image seriously at all.

In fact, none of the supernatural elements came off as believable. They were strictly played for laughs.

And that’s the biggest problem with COUNTDOWN. Its horror aspects are never taken seriously, and the film only succeeds when it’s aiming for your funny bone. So, it’s not a complete loss as some of the comedy works, but if you’re looking for a riveting horror movie this Halloween, COUNTDOWN isn’t it.

—END—

 

 

ANNABELLE COMES HOME (2019) – Not Much of a Homecoming

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annabelle comes home

Look out behind you!  That’s Madison Iseman, Katie Sarifie, Annabelle, and McKenna Grace in a scene from ANNABELLE COMES HOME (2019).

Couldn’t she just stay away?

ANNABELLE COMES HOME (2019) is the third film in the ANNABELLE series, a series that is part of the CONJURING universe, and I have to say that the longer this series and films in this universe continue the less I like these movies.

Creepy dolls are a thing. I get that. And the Annabelle doll, which first showed up in the original THE CONJURING (2013), is a really frightening looking doll. It’s a shame that writers struggle so much to come up with good stories about it.

After that brief appearance in THE CONJURING, the film that spawned this cinematic universe and the one that remains the best in the entire series, the powers that be decided Annabelle needed a movie of her own. That film was ANNABELLE (2014) and it was pretty bad. Still, it was followed by a sequel— actually a prequel— entitled ANNABELLE: CREATION (2017), and this one was actually pretty good. In fact, I enjoyed ANNABELLE: CREATION quite a bit.

Now we have ANNABELLE COMES HOME, which takes place after ANNABELLE: CREATION and ANNABELLE but before THE CONJURING.

ANNABELLE COMES HOME begins when our friendly neighborhood demonologists Ed (Patrick Wilson) and Lorraine Warren (Vera Farmiga) first confiscate the Annabelle doll from its frightened owners and agree to take it off their hands and keep it safe in the protective confines of the basement of their home, where they store all the other demonic stuff they’ve collected over the years. This is a line of thinking from these movies that I’ve never understood. I get the idea of keeping all these evil things in one place, to prevent them from harming the world, sort of a supernatural prison, if you will, but inside their own home? Wouldn’t it make more sense to amass this stuff as far away from one’s home as possible? Like maybe inside a place with concrete walls and lots of locks? But nope, they keep their evil collection locked behind a closed door in their house, which opens the door, eh hem, for the kind of devilry that happens in this movie.

Ed and Lorraine Warren were real people, by the way, not fictional characters, most famous for their investigation of the Amityville house. Ed passed away in 2006 and Lorraine just recently passed in April 2019. In fact, ANNABELLE COMES HOME is dedicated to Lorraine Warren.

Getting back to the movie, Ed and Lorraine leave their ten year-old daughter Judy (McKenna Grace) with her babysitter Mary Ellen (Madison Iseman) while they go out, ostensibly to investigate the house in the original THE CONJURING, since the action in this film takes place just before the events in that first movie.

Mary Ellen is quite responsible, but her friend Daniela (Katie Sarifie) is not, and since she blames herself for her father’s death, since he died in a car crash while she was at the wheel, she longs to make some sort of supernatural contact with her dad. So, she invites herself over to the Warren house and sneaks into the secret room and in the process of snooping around, accidentally lets the Annabelle doll out of its glass case.

Oops!

Annabelle, now free, decides to make life a living hell for the three girls and unleashes all sorts of nasty demons and spirits to wreak havoc inside and outside the home, all in the hope of stealing a soul so that the demon within Annabelle can possess a body rather than a doll.

That in a nutshell is the plot of ANNABELLE COMES HOME, and as stories go, it’s not bad. I was certainly into it. That being said, I wasn’t into it for long because the writing and directing just weren’t up to the task of delivering a satisfying horror tale about Annabelle.

ANNABELLE COMES HOME was written and directed by Gary Dauberman, and although this was his directorial debut, he has plenty of writing credits. Dauberman has written all three Annabelle movies as well as THE NUN (2018), another film in the CONJURING universe and another film I did not like. Dauberman is also one of the writers who’s been working on the IT movies, based on Stephen King’s novel.

Here, I had a couple of issues with the writing. The first is with dialogue. At times, the dialogue is flat-out awful, and most of these instances involve scenes with Ed and Lorraine Warren. When they speak of demons and spirits, I just want to break out laughing. Their lines come off as phony and formulaic. The dialogue with Judy and her babysitters is much better.

Also, the story itself has a weird construct. The film opens with Ed and Lorraine obtaining the Annabelle doll, and as they make provisions for its safe keeping, it seems as if they will be the main characters in this movie. But then they disappear for the rest of the film, only returning for a ridiculous happy ending where for some reason time is spent showing Judy’s birthday party, as if that’s a key plot point in this story. I’m sorry. Was this called ANNABELLE COMES HOME SO SHE CAN ATTEND JUDY’S BIRTHDAY PARTY?

Which brings me to next problem: pacing. This film is paced terribly. The story has multiple threats attacking simultaneously, but rather than run with it and build to an absolutely frenetic climax, the story seems to want no part of this. Every time something happens, and a character seems pinned by a demon or spirit, the story switches to another character, and we follow them, while the previous character simply disappears for a while. There is no sense of building suspense at all.

For me, during the film’s second half when things should have been frightening, I was bored. And then to make matters worse, at the end, we go to a birthday party for ten minutes. So don’t forget to wear your party hat!

In spite of all this, some of the acting is pretty darned good.  Young McKenna Grace turns in the best performance as ten year-old Judy. It’s her first time playing Judy, as the character was played by Sterling Jerins in the first two CONJURING movies. Grace is very good at being the kid who’s wise to the ways of the demons and who, like her mother, has the ability to sense things about people. And if she looks familiar doing this sort of thing, that’s because she played a very similar role on the superior Netflix TV show THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE (2018) where she played young Theo. McKenna Grace is only 13, but she has already amassed 51 screen credits, including roles in I,TONYA (2017), READY PLAYER ONE (2018), and CAPTAIN MARVEL (2019).

Madison Iseman is also very good as babysitter Mary Ellen, and I liked Katie Sarife even more as the often annoying but never cliché Daniela, as the character was given some background and depth, making her a bit more fleshed out than the usual characters of this type.  Michael Cimino was also enjoyable in the lighthearted role of Bob, Mary Ellen’s love interest and generally nice guy.

As for Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga, they don’t fare as well. Their early scenes are the most cliché in the entire movie, then they disappear for the rest of the movie, only to return for the anticlimactic birthday party.

Another pet peeve: this movie takes place in the early 1970s, and one key sequence involves the remote control of a television set. While remote controls certainly existed in the early 1970s, they were not prevalent at all the way they are today. Most TVs were controlled by knobs or buttons on the console. Small point, but it stood out for me as not being terribly realistic.

The scariest part of ANNABELLE COMES HOME is the way Annabelle looks. Annabelle has always been one creepy doll.

And the film itself looks good. There are lots of cool looking demons and creatures, and they show up and disappear on cue, but their effect isn’t much different than the sort of thrills one gets inside an amusement park haunted house. They pop out at you and they’re scary, but that’s it.

It’s not enough because ANNABELLE COMES HOME is a movie, and as such, it is supposed to tell a story.

Writer/director Gary Dauberman seems to have forgotten this concept.

As a result, ANNABELLE COMES HOME isn’t much of a homecoming.

—END—

Books by Michael Arruda:

New in 2019! DARK CORNERS, Michael Arruda’s second short story collection, contains ten tales of horror, six reprints and four stories original to this collection.

Dark Corners cover (1)

Waiting for you in Dark Corners are tales of vampires, monsters, werewolves, demonic circus animals, and eternal darkness. Be prepared to be both frightened and entertained. You never know what you will find lurking in dark corners.

Ebook: $3.99. Available at http://www.crossroadspress.com and at Amazon.com.  Print on demand version available at https://www.amazon.com/dp/1949914437.

TIME FRAME,  science fiction novel by Michael Arruda.  

How far would you go to save your family? Would you change the course of time? That’s the decision facing Adam Cabral in this mind-bending science fiction adventure by Michael Arruda.

Ebook version:  $2.99. Available at http://www.crossroadpress.com. Print version:  $18.00. Includes postage! Email your order request to mjarruda33@gmail.com. Also available at Amazon.com.

IN THE SPOOKLIGHT, movie review collection by Michael Arruda.

InTheSpooklight_NewText

Michael Arruda reviews horror movies throughout history, from the silent classics of the 1920s, Universal horror from the 1930s-40s, Hammer Films of the 1950s-70s, all the way through the instant classics of today. If you like to read about horror movies, this is the book for you!

 Ebook version:  $4.99.  Available at http://www.crossroadpress.com.  Print version:  $18.00.  Includes postage. Email your order request to mjarruda33@gmail.com. Also available at Amazon.com.

FOR THE LOVE OF HORROR, first short story collection by Michael Arruda.  

For_the_love_of_Horror- original cover

Print cover

For the Love of Horror cover (3)

Ebook cover

 

Michael Arruda’s first short story collection, featuring a wraparound story which links all the tales together, asks the question: can you have a relationship when your partner is surrounded by the supernatural? If you thought normal relationships were difficult, wait to you read about what the folks in these stories have to deal with. For the love of horror!

 Ebook version:  $4.99.  Available at http://www.crossroadpress.com. Print version:  $18.00.  Includes postage. Email your order request to mjarruda33@gmail.com. Also available at Amazon.com.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

THE CURSE OF LA LLORONA (2019) – Tepid Horror Movie Not Scary

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curse of la llorona

As a horror movie fan, I see most of the horror movies which make their way to my local theater, even those which I expect to be pretty bad. Sometimes I’m pleasantly surprised. Other times, I’m not.

In the case of THE CURSE OF LA LLORONA (2019), I was not.

THE CURSE OF LA LLORONA tells the story of a demon that steals children away from their families. Social worker Anna Tate-Garcia (Linda Cardellini) suspects a woman is abusing her children and has them removed from her custody against the mother’s wishes who tries to tell Anna that she’s locking them inside a closet to protect them. Yeah, right. Of course, in this case, it’s true.

When the children do end up dead, the mother tells Anna they were killed by La Llorona, and then she tells Anna that she prayed to La Llorona so it will take Anna’s children away as payback. Ouch! So, I guess you’re a bit bitter, eh?

Anyway, that’s exactly what happens. La Llorona sets her sights on Anna’s two children, and when Anna seeks the help of a local priest Father Perez (Tony Amendola), he sends her to a specialist in these things, a former priest who battles the supernatural by using unconventional methods. Anna agrees, and she meets with Rafael Olvera (Raymond Cruz), and he agrees to protect her children and do battle with La Llorona.

I like the idea of a demon that preys on children. It’s pretty scary. But THE CURSE OF LA LLORONA does little with this idea to keep it scary.

First off, the actual demon, La Llorona, doesn’t do a whole heck of a lot other than zoom into people’s faces and scream loudly at them.  It shows up for some typical jump scares, and does enjoy a few fine creepy moments, like a scene where it sneaks up behind Anna’s daughter in the bath tub and tries to drown her, but these moments are few and far between.

The film isn’t scary. In fact, the audience laughed more than screamed, and it certainly didn’t seem like nervous laughter.

The story is pretty standard and not fleshed out. Very little about La Llorona is explained. Anna’s husband, a cop, is deceased, but we learn nothing about how he died, nor does his death have anything to do with this story, which seems like a missed opportunity. Anna accepts both Father Perez’s advice and Rafael’s help without batting an eye. We learn nothing about Rafael’s past or background to explain why he’s an expert in this sort of thing.

The whole story is rather superficial with details simply glossed over. It’s a mediocre screenplay by Mikki Daughtry and Tobias Iaconis.

Director Michael Chaves gives us nary a scare.

The story takes place in 1973, seemingly for no other reason than to fit into the timeline of THE CONJURING/ANNABELLE universe, in which this film takes place. Barely. There’s one very brief reference to the doll Annabelle by Father Perez. Blink and you’ll miss it.

Unfortunately, the film doesn’t really look like it’s taking place in 1973. Sure, there are old style TVs, landline phones, and 1970s era cars, but the clothes and hairstyles look like 2019.

The one thing  THE CURSE OF LA LLORONA has going for it is the acting. Linda Cardellini is very good in the lead role as Anna. I like Cardellini a lot, as she has been excellent in such films as GREEN BOOK (2018) and THE FOUNDER (2016), as well as on the TV shows BLOODLINE (2015-2017) and MAD MEN (2013-2015), to name just some of her credits, and way back in the day of course she was on ER (2003-2009).

Raymond Cruz, who played drug dealer Tuco Salamanca on both BETTER CALL SAUL (2015-2016) and BREAKING BAD (2008-2009)— in fact someone in the audience called out, “Hey, it’s Tuco!”— is strangely cast as supernatural mystic Rafael Olvera. I’m tempted to say he was miscast. For much of the film he seems like he’s on downers, as if he’s going to doze off at any moment. But somehow by the time the film ends, he pulls it off. It’s an unconventional take on this type of character. The result is a performance that is weird at first but ends up as being rather refreshing.

THE CURSE OF LA LLORONA is a rather weak horror movie. Bereft of scares, it tells a story with no meat on its bones and features a demon whose bark is worse than its bite. It likes to scream a lot, but that’s about it.

For a horror movie about a demon that preys on children not to be frightening, that speaks volumes, and is really all you need to know about THE CURSE OF LA LLORONA.

—END—