Remember when The Conjuring was the next big thing in horror? It may be hard to believe now, but upon its release in 2013, James Wan's chiller was greeted with the same reception that met recent sensations like Hereditary and It Follows. Early rumors suggested it was the scariest movie since The Exorcist, the MPAA gave it an R rating just for being too scary, and critics were downright ecstatic, billing it as a return to the kind of old-school fright fest that avoided cheap scares or excessive gore. Two spin-offs and one sequel later, the franchise is now the poster child for the pitfalls of modern studio horror. I totally loved the Wan-directed Conjuring 2, flaws and all, but even I couldn't get on board with last year's Annabelle: Creation, which ultimately felt like a series of jump scares in search of a story.
Another problem growing more and more prominent with time is this franchise's total misunderstanding of how pacing works. Wan's films struggle to balance scares with narrative mechanics, but there's always some level of momentum keeping the adventures of the Warren family moving forward. Here? That's a different story. Nobody's saying you can't have jump scares in the third act of your movie, but it's troubling when the whole plot grinds to a halt just so you can get a little jolt out of your audience. Once again, this just reinforces the idea that these spin-offs have more in common with carnival rides than movies. Normal horror concerns are irrelevant when your viewers are paying to be shocked.
With that in mind, it's fair to say that The Nun is about as appealing as a trip to your local amusement park's Halloween spectacle. Is it fun to laugh when something creepy startles you? Sure! Is it repetitive as hell after about 20 minutes? No question.
And don't even get me started on the final scene. I know a few people were questioning why a movie about the creepy nun needed to exist in the first place, but it's not like this film had to justify its existence to the audience. Instead, we get a final coda that feels totally out of place, serving only to provide an answer to a question that nobody was asking and shoehorning this character and this story into the greater timeline of the CCU (Conjuring Cinematic Universe). It's laughable and pointless, but then again, so is the rest of the movie.
Images courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures
Enter The Nun. Corin Hardy's 1950s-set nightmare tracks the origins of the creepy nun from the aforementioned 2016 sequel, a demonic entity that haunted the dreams of Vera Farmiga's Lorraine Warren. The character was sufficiently spooky, but this spin-off continues the Conjuring franchise's steady transition from unnerving horror bliss to the cinematic equivalent of Halloween horror mazes. Director Hardy clearly has fun playing with visual unity and chaos, and the film continues the series tradition of schlocky religious madness. Plus, there are a few strong jump scares, engineered to make teenagers everywhere scream with glee. But to nobody's surprise, it all comes, unfortunately, at the expense of story and pacing, dooming the film to a forgettable, mediocre, and decidedly un-terrifying fate. You'll sleep fine after seeing this one.
Our story begins in a Romanian abbey, where two nuns are desperately seeking a mysterious object that has the potential to defeat a great evil. One of the nuns is consumed by this dark force, and the other chooses to jump to her death rather than encounter such a demon. As a result, the Vatican appoints Father Burke, an expert in areas of the subhuman and occult, to investigate the suicide and ensure that all is well in the abbey. To help with the questioning of the nuns, he brings Sister Irene (Taissa Farmiga) along, a student of the faith who has not officially taken her vows yet.
With the help of a flirty fellow named Frenchie (Jonas Bloquet), who also happened to discover the body of the nun, Burke and Irene reach the secluded abbey. Of course, if you've ever seen a Conjuring movie before, you know things go south pretty quickly. An ancient evil lies at the heart of this centuries-old building, and it's up to Burke and Irene to overcome their own demons and stop this demon before it destroys us all.
Hardy certainly has a keen visual eye, even if he's once again limited to haunted house aesthetics and dusty old rooms. I know that audiences have come to expect a certain framework from these Conjuring movies, a framework bound by the limits of practical and spiritual logic, but I would love to see one of these things take the action into the open one day. Put simply, I'm getting a little tired of wondering what's around each new corner. However, I'm definitely not getting tired of this franchise's knack for world-building and religious iconography, which Hardy and screenwriter Gary Dauberman use to their distinct advantage. If it's true that a spooky origin story for Valak the Defiler is slightly unnecessary, we might as well have fun incorporating some wacky Christian mythology into a silly genre outing like this.
Yet even with a heavy dosage of strangeness and a few unsettling images, The Nun follows the same repetitive beats as its predecessors. There's a creepy opening scene, a little bit of exposition, another big jump scare, some more exposition, a quasi-action movie finale, a chilling stinger, and so on. In an odd way, this formula has become as restrictive as the Marvel blueprint, only without the lovable characters and eye-popping action to sustain it successfully. The Nun has it all, but much like Sandberg's Annabelle: Creation, it lacks a fundamental understanding of why Wan's Conjuring films are so thrilling. Those movies work because you care about the Warrens; more importantly, you care about the families being terrorized. Here, Burke and Irene are just there, vessels to get us from one scare to the next. Who cares if they live or die?
Another problem growing more and more prominent with time is this franchise's total misunderstanding of how pacing works. Wan's films struggle to balance scares with narrative mechanics, but there's always some level of momentum keeping the adventures of the Warren family moving forward. Here? That's a different story. Nobody's saying you can't have jump scares in the third act of your movie, but it's troubling when the whole plot grinds to a halt just so you can get a little jolt out of your audience. Once again, this just reinforces the idea that these spin-offs have more in common with carnival rides than movies. Normal horror concerns are irrelevant when your viewers are paying to be shocked.
With that in mind, it's fair to say that The Nun is about as appealing as a trip to your local amusement park's Halloween spectacle. Is it fun to laugh when something creepy startles you? Sure! Is it repetitive as hell after about 20 minutes? No question.
And don't even get me started on the final scene. I know a few people were questioning why a movie about the creepy nun needed to exist in the first place, but it's not like this film had to justify its existence to the audience. Instead, we get a final coda that feels totally out of place, serving only to provide an answer to a question that nobody was asking and shoehorning this character and this story into the greater timeline of the CCU (Conjuring Cinematic Universe). It's laughable and pointless, but then again, so is the rest of the movie.
THE FINAL GRADE: C (5.3/10)
Images courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures
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