Patrick Wilson | Screenlife Reviews

The Conjuring series may very well be the best horror franchise chugging along today. Sure it has had its misfires, with The Nun and The Curse of la Llorona, but for everyone of those (which are still admittedly better than half the big studio garbage pumped out today) you get a true horror classic like Annabelle: Creation or the first two Conjuring films. It’s safe to say the franchise would not exist if it weren’t for one James Wan, the best working horror director today. His rising star may have prevented him from helming the third instalment in the mainline series –The Devil Made Me Do It – but that hasn’t stopped Warner Bros from surging ahead anyway, with la Llorona director Michael Chaves stepping into the directing shoes.

How does he do? Pretty damn well if you ask me. The Devil Made Me Do it never fully recovers from Wan’s absence, but Chaves wisely moves the story into new territory, centering on real-life demonologists Ed (Patrick Wilson) and Lorraine Warren (Vera Farmiga) as they not only battle unholy forces again but the judicial system, in a frantic race to find crucial evidence that will spare a possessed young man from a murder charge. It’s a story that is, perhaps to what some will consider its detriment, less focused on scares and more so on the relationship between Ed and Lorraine. This is Wilson and Farmiga’s fourth time playing these roles and they get better every time, with such a natural chemistry and believable love for each other that it is just impossible not to root for them against evil. By throwing new, very human hurdles at the Warrens (Ed is in constant fear of suffering a heart attack following an incident) Chaves plays on our fear of losing one or both of these characters to terrific effect. It isn’t so much scary as it is unbelievably tense at times, and you fully believe that the couple could perish at any minute despite their headlining status.

Where the story falters is in its characterisation of the supporting cast. In the previous two Conjuring films the Warrens were used almost as a device to stitch together a broken family, revealing their bond and endearing themselves to the audience as they help some truly damaged people. Here however, the victim in question, Arne Johnson (Ruairi O’Connor) just isn’t given enough screen-time or things to do to ever truly make you care. Once he arrives in prison following the demon-driven murder of his housemate, that is pretty much it for his character, who acts more as a visual ticking clock to remind you of the stakes for the Warrens rather than his own fully fleshed out character. There are attempts made to flesh out Arne through his devoted girlfriend Debbie (Sarah Catherine Hook), with Hook giving a fine dramatic performance, suitably distraught at her boyfriends predicament but nothing we haven’t seen before from the franchise. By not having the Warren’s thoroughly interact with Arne and learn about him the whole affair becomes a bit deflated. We only really care because we have a pre-existing care for the Warrens and no half-baked attempts to assert Ed’s confidence in Arne’s innocence because he caught a look in his eyes is enough to fully bring the audience on board.

Then there are the scares, which by most people’s assessment will make or break the film. Nothing here is as iconic or instantly impactful as the Nun’s arrival in The Conjuring 2 or the game of hide and clap in the original, but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t some incredibly well shot and paced scares. The highlight is undoubtedly an all-too brief water-bed scene, which puts child actor Julian Hillard’s skills on full display. It’s a slow burn of a scare, but when it hits it hits like a shot-gun blast to the face. Everything else… not so much. It’s a hard thing to dance around without spoiling things but sufficed to say Chaves places so much focus on the mystery of the demon and its origins – replacing the simple terror of a demon unleashing hell of the previous films with something more manipulated- that the premise just inherently some of the fear factor. What we’re left with are a series of pretty stock-standard jump scares that, whilst predictable, are still done better than 90% of the horror competition out there, with Chaves always achieving the desired jolt through slick and measured camera movements, demonstrating far more control over the scares than on la Llorona.

The Devil Made Me Do It marks a continuation of the shift in tone set by Annabelle Comes Home to less conventional horror storytelling, this time in the form of a demonic-leaning murder-mystery. The lack of James Wan’s flair with the camera is sorely felt at times but Chaves does a commendable job stepping into his shoes; furthering the bond between the Warrens and ensuring the audience has a fun time while he does it, even if the scares don’t quite measure up to the franchise’s best. We may never hit the nightmare inducing heights of those first 2 films again (unless Wan makes a miraculous return) but if this is the direction that the Conjuring universe is heading in going forward, then the future is anything but boring.

The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It stars Patrick Wilson, Vera Farmiga, Ruairi O’Connor, Sarah Catherine Hook, Julian Hillard, Eugenie Bondurant & John Noble – In cinemas now and streaming on HBO Max in the US.

Annabelle Comes Home is an interestingly placed film in the Conjuring universe. It serves as a convergence of the Conjuring film series and the Annabelle spin-off films – the Avengers of this shared universe, if you will. On paper the premise sounds dynamite: Annabelle the evil doll joining forces with all the other cursed nasties in the Warren’s (the demonologists from The Conjuring) artefact room to wreak havoc. However what we’re ultimately presented with is a hodge-podge of random scares and disjointed, half-baked premises that ultimately don’t go anywhere. It’s not the worst film in the Conjuring universe so far, but it’s certainly not up to the standard of the main series films or 2017’s excellent Annabelle: Creation.

The spin-off opts for a more contained story than the mainline Conjuring films, isolating the action almost entirely to the Warren’s house. When Ed (Patrick Wilson) and Lorraine (Vera Famiga) Warren go away for a weekend they leave their daughter Judy (Mckenna Grace) in the care of babysitter Mary Ellen (Madison Iseman) and her uninvited friend Daniela (Katie Sarife). Daniela has recently lost her father, and enters the Warren’s artefact room in an attempt to contact the spirit of the deceased patriarch, unwittingly unlocking Annabelle and the evil spirit within. From here we have ourselves a movie as Annabelle proceeds to take control of every haunted item within the room, turning this laid-back weekend into a fight for survival as the three girls are haunted by a variety of demonic entities.

The films in the Conjuring universe up to this point have largely stuck to a serious tone, foregoing jokes in favour of intense scares and creepy narratives that always keep you on your toes waiting for the next big scare. Annabelle Comes Home breaks from tradition here by playing with a fun, haunted house atmosphere. It is a different tone, choosing to focus on the craziness of multiple monsters and demons stalking and toying with their victims in an enclosed space rather than the mental terrorism inflicted by the demons in the other Conjuring films. With this lighter tone comes a greater focus on comedy, with an entire subplot dedicated to a potential love interest for Mary Ellen, which varies between reasonably funny and downright awful. The character of Bob (Michael Cimino), also known as “Bob’s got balls”, handles the brunt of this humour and the movie, quite frankly, thinks he’s a lot funnier than he actually is. There’s only so many times you can make the same joke about a timid, harmless guy who is surprisingly useful during a demon attack and the character quickly becomes grating. His awkward encounters with Mary Ellen are irritating rather than endearing and the running “Bob’s got balls” joke is overused without ever actually being funny. It’s a self-referential wink to Bob’s arc and his later relevance to the plot which comes across as the writers thinking it’s more clever than it really is.

This leads in to another major problem with the film: pacing. The only way to describe the first 45 minutes is glacial with barely a scare to be found within it. It’s all an excruciatingly long setup for the events to come, introducing us to these three main characters and showing us the layout of the house. Whilst overly long, the film does a good job making sure we know the entire layout of the house, which will soon become a prison for the characters. I always knew where everyone was in relation to the other humans and monsters, which makes it far spookier when parts of the house change as the demons start to emerge. Speaking of monsters, there are plenty to choose from here, all controlled by the demonic entity that inhabits Annabelle, and that is really the biggest issue with Annabelle Comes Home. There’s no development given to these other demons, therefore no reason to be scared of them other than their looks or because they’ve arrived as part of a loud jump scare. The most we get is character’s reading portions of case files on a few of the more prominent creatures, however it doesn’t mean much when the histories being described sound more interesting than the film you’re watching. The Conjuring 2 is a perfect example of well developed scares: we spend time with the family being haunted and come to understand their dynamic and they way they are being haunted. This attachment to the characters means we actually care and empathise when the scares start and what scares our characters scares us too. Here, the characters just aren’t developed or likeable enough and make some downright stupid decisions.

The horror genre isn’t exactly known for its acting talent with the rare exception here and there. In the mainline Conjuring films, Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga were exceptions, giving well rounded, believable performances as real life demonologists Ed and Lorraine Warren. There was much hype surrounding their return for the third Annabelle film but if you were one of those people excited to see them kicking ghost butt, you might want to temper your expectations. The film is laser focused on their daughter, using the elder Warrens as a framing device to tease the horror she is about to face. McKenna Grace is the star here, at just 13 years old, she carries the film, giving a performance that is incredibly mature for her age, as a child living with intense bullying due to her parents occupation who also happens to have her mother’s gift of seeing undead spirits. She’s the most capable of the three girls at handling the situation unfolding, which can be a little unsettling considering if in the same situation most people would sit down and simultaneously cry and wet themselves. Madison Iseman’s character Mary Ellen is just about as boring and stereotypical as you can get when it comes to Final Girls. She doesn’t have a whole lot to do other than console Judie and Daniela and scream, and she does what she can but the role is ultimately just bland with some truly awful dialogue at times. Her chemistry with Michael Cimino, who plays Bob, is non-existent and seems like something of an afterthought to give the character some kind of subplot. The final member of the trio is Katie Sarife’s character Daniela, who has the most complete arc of all the characters, which stems from her guilt over the death of her father. Whilst she can be extremely annoying at times and her decisions often don’t make any sense, there’s a vulnerability to her character and her motivations are innocent, even if she causes one hell of a night.

Annabelle Comes Home is ultimately a disappointment and sits in the middle of the pack of Conjuring universe films. An interesting premise is wasted on weakly written characters and scares that ultimately feel bland and unwarranted. The lack of development of any of the key monsters renders them useless when it comes to frightening audiences other than the occasional jump scare. The Conjuring and Annabelle franchises have been better than this – here’s hoping they can regain their quality.

Annabelle Comes Home stars McKenna Grace, Madison Iseman, Katie Sarife, Michael Cimino, Patrick Wilson & Vera Farmiga – In cinemas now.