The Nun II (2023) - Movie Review

Well, shit. After gradually warming up to the Conjuring Universe, the official threequel The Devil Made Me Do It and the more recent atrocious copycats like The Unholy, The Exorcism Of God, and The Pope’s Exorcist have made me seriously reconsider that position. As much as I have good memories of at least half of these films, the underlying dogma of this entire sub-genre is starting to wear thin on my sensibilities, and the quality of the films themselves isn’t really picking up the slack. Still, I am nothing if not open to being surprised, and the first Nun is still a film I quite liked when I first saw it, so I’m willing to give this one a chance.

The Conjuring 3: The Devil Made Me Do It (2021) - Movie Review

Over the past couple years, my opinions on the Conjuring cinematic universe have gone from strength to strength. To the point where I’m likely in the minority for such things, given how favourably I’ve been towards the recent run of spin-off features. I still maintain that the first two Annabelle movies are a hard pass, but The Nun, The Curse Of The Weeping Woman, and even Annabelle Comes Home are still in my good books at the time of writing this.

As such, I was reasonably looking forward to the new mainline Conjuring film, albeit slightly taken aback by the real-life inspiration this time around (making it about a real-life murder case hits a bad note that just a haunted house doesn’t manage). But it turns out that I was looking in entirely the wrong direction as far as misgivings with this feature, sad to say.

Annabelle Comes Home (2019) - Movie Review

As much as The Conjuring has put its boot print on the face of modern horror cinema, its spin-offs have been… less than ideal, Annabelle in particular. The first Annabelle marks one of the most unintentionally funny ‘horror’ flicks I’ve seen, to the point where its infamous elevator scene still makes me giggle to this day. Given what I went into with Shazam! earlier in the year, I won’t revive that whole mess but, suffice it to say, Annabelle: Creation wasn’t all that good either. Even though I went to bat for The Nun when few others did, I’ll admit that I wasn’t expecting much out of this one. Thankfully, I can report back that I finally, finally have an Annabelle movie I can get behind.

The Curse Of The Weeping Woman (2019) - Movie Review

While Marvel and DC continue to hash it out for the place of the kingpin of mainstream superhero cinema, horror has its own monarchy: The Conjuring Universe. Not since the days of Saw consistently blowing up the Halloween schedule has James Wan had this tight of a stranglehold on mainstream horror, having fingerprints on The Conjuring, Annabelle, last year’s The Nun, not to mention outliers like the Insidious series as well as the bane of my existence that is Lights Out. Today’s film technically doesn’t fall under the Conjuring canon, but through a brief inclusion of Annabelle herself, it still has a marked place within it. Think of it as the Redman to the larger universe’s Wu-Tang Clan, or (in more genre-appropriate terms) what The Marked Ones was for Paranormal Activity.

The Nun (2018) - Movie Review

The plot: At a monastery in Romania, a nun has been found dead from an apparent suicide. Wanting to find out what exactly happened, and to make sure that this incident has defiled the sacred ground of the monastery, the Vatican sends Father Burke (Demián Bichir) and novitiate Sister Irene (Taissa Farmiga) to investigate. As they search the monastery and the surrounding area for clues, with the help of local farmer Frenchie (Jonas Bloquet), they discover something truly evil hiding within.

Annabelle: Creation (2017) - Movie Review

Well, after the unprecedented success of Ouija: Origin Of Evil from last year, a film that I still absolutely adore, I figure it’s about time to put that hope for better cinema into practice. Between Origin Of Evil showing that it is still possible to make a prequel film that outshines the original and the general unpredictability surrounding a lot of this year’s releases, I have more than enough reason to believe that, in spite of how lame the original film was, this film could still turn out alright. So, let’s take a look at this latest horror film from the director of Lights Out… wow. I think I just set a world record for the fastest loss of optimism on that one, but let’s press on anyway.

The Conjuring 2 (2016) - Movie Review

While the original Saw gave James Wan his official debut and Insidious gave audiences a real taste of what Wan’s style of filmmaking was, it was The Conjuring that gave him the break he desperately needed. Aside from being a critical darling when it came out, and being a friggin’ awesome horror flick in its own right, it also proved that Wan wasn’t completely dependent on Leigh Whannell’s scripting to deliver a gripping story. With a nicely retro approach to scares and an insane level of dedication to adhering to the era in which the story was set, not to mention a great cast, it’s the kind of horror film that I can easily see being remembered several years from now.

Then came the spin-off film Annabelle, Wan teaming back up with Whannell for Insidious: Chapter 2, and then Wan being a creative consultant for Lights Out… wow, that’s a bad track record in terms of horror flicks. Don’t get me wrong, I still love the guy’s work but, in terms of confirming that this sequel to probably his most celebrated work will actually be a success, it is less than convincing, shall we say. Of course, because I will never get tired of saying it, I’m willing to be proven wrong on this one.