The Conjuring Review

Here’s the formula: Take one creaky house; add a simple but loveable family; throw in a few demons and you’ve got yourself one helluva scary movie, right? Not exactly.

The Conjuring, directed by James Wan (who brought us Saw and Insidious), falls short in an attempt to resurrect the horror genre by simply being lazy. Sure, there are some scares as a result of many—too many—jumpy moments, but anyone can make an audience jump with loud noises and a creepy doll; it doesn’t make it good horror.

This film tells the supposed true story of the Perron family and their terrifying ordeal when they move into a centuries-old farm house (secluded of course!) and a haunting presence starts to torment them. With the help of ghostbuster/demonologist couple Ed and Lorraine Warren (played by Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga respectively), the Perrons undergo terror, violence, and a lot of screaming children when the dark force becomes disturbed.

Doors begin to move independently, the family dog won’t enter the house, the creepiest child begins to sleepwalk, and perhaps the most chilling is the clock that always stops at 3:07am. These little moments begin to build at an alarmingly slow rate, giving off the sense of foreboding but ultimately falling flat. Curiously, the non-scary moments are simply on screen for expositional dialogue, and even then the characters and plotlines are not completely well rounded or tied up in the end.

It is clear that Director Wan tried so desperately to use this film as a cultural and artistic nod to the great horrors of the past. Genre fans will see resemblances to The Exorcist (the cold rooms, the Catholic undertones, etc.) as well as some allusions to The Shining but what once seemed new and fresh in the eyes of the scary movie-going crowd is now just a barrage of clichés.

The performances were fine; Lilli Taylor and Ron Livingston as the Perron parents are convincing, and Wilson and Farmiga do a good job of delivering the oh-so cringe worthy expository lines, but the film’s real flaw is simply lack of originality. Wan succeeded in reinventing the genre with Saw, and he did a decent job with Insidious, but I’m afraid The Conjuring did not live up to the hype. Spooky camera angles and creaking doors can only take a film so far.