"Premonitize" is an unholy mess – Rolling Stone



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The twisted magic of the original Conjuring the movie seems terribly distant these days, is not it? In the 2013 horror film directed by James Wan, a large blue-collar family was tormented by a former demon, fears of an old-fashioned jump and a relentless fear mingling with a deeply human story. the fact that we care about the characters has made the chills even more important (and much more effective). Despite the studio's budget, this ghost story also possessed an elegant simplicity, Wan shaping one of the most disturbing scenes of modern horror: a simple image of a girl watching the darkness behind the door of his room, insisting that there was someone right there. It's not so much the darkness that sold the scene; It was the face of the girl and the absolute terror, the tears in her eyes that she conveyed. Since then, this horror franchise has added spinoffs (see: Annabelle films) and doubled on crisis jumps and genre pyrotechnics. Even worse, he has abandoned people. Each new entry feels a little more insistent, overdetermined and soulless.

Set in 1952, The nun pretends to be a prequel to the demonic shenanigans of the first ConjuringInverted movies – and it starts pretty well. Two nuns from the Romanian Abbey of St. Carta confront a demonic presence in a forbidden corner of the old building. (There is even a sign "God ends here.") One is consumed by darkness; the other hooks to the abbey to prevent this mysterious evil from finding a host in his body. The experienced priest, Father Burke (Demian Bichir), is called by the Vatican to investigate and, because it is a convent, he has assigned a partner to the young novitiate, Sister Irene (Taissa Farmiga, the younger brother of Conjuring star Vera Farmiga), who has been touched by a variety of religious visions over the years. The duo heads to Biertan, Romania, and meets a local peasant known as "Frenchie" (Jonas Bloquet), who discovered the corpse. Their attempts to investigate the young woman's death are complicated by the fact that everyone acts in a strange way: they rush mysteriously into the corners and rarely speak. Even the Abbess herself, whose face we never see, only speaks in a sinister creak behind a dark veil.

At first, the film's growing sense of threat and director Corin Hardy's evocative use of Romanian scenery (with a lot of steep, mountainous landscapes and sinister shots of the sky) is a throwback in Wan's original. But, tragically, we do not have much meaning on these central characters – which seems to be a missed opportunity, as there are only three, and 90 minutes whole Father Burke feels remorse after a war exorcism he directed against a young boy, but the film does almost nothing with his regrets. the child simply becomes another supernatural cliche pursuing our hero through the halls of the abbey. Something similar happens with Sister Irene's visions, which contain a clear and useless clue to reveal towards the end of the film (though they might have revealed something about this young woman's character). In the meantime, we've been told that the Abbey was bombed during World War II, and that this may well have something to do with the evils that are now emerging – a potentially resonant idea that is becoming another cheap narrative convenience here. .

The dark and scary mood, so well established The nunThe first scenes do not last either: once everyone arrives at the abbey, the film simply gives up the ghost and cynically indulges in all the horror tricks of the book. Hands are bursting through doors and grabbing people; the crosses turn as if by magic; the nuns fly or are inflamed. On the way, we are awash with reflections and scary figures that spring from the darkness and, of course, from these mandatory shots. A few of these things go very far, and many of these things do not go very long at all. True horror requires anticipation to work properly, but it is difficult to anticipate anything when everything is already started. The fear dissipates. Our cries become only tired sighs.

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