Director: Leigh Janiak
Year: 2021
Country: USA
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Witchcraft
Plot:
Living alone with her family in a small village, a young woman who got caught up in the hysteria for a witch-hunt to determine the cause of a series of supernatural antics maligning the village, and when a curse is enacted based on a grave secret the couple in the present day try to force that secret out to end the curse.
Review:
Overall, this one manages to generate some highly enjoyable elements. One of the strongest aspects here is the generally enjoyable build-up that places a lot to like on this kind of build-up focusing on the relationships in the village. Getting a good look at the general interaction within the set of friends who are in their own cliques which resort to bullying those they deem unwarranted, their secret lesbian dalliances that are to be kept hidden from everyone else, and the general air of fear and paranoia that emerges between the villages as the events start to unfold provide the film with a highly impressive early starting point to the later supernatural actions. Given how well these tie into the characters so far in the story, it allows for a rather fun setup that gives us a great introduction to everything.
Once those actions start to emerge, the film is an immaculate build-up of genuinely terrifying actions that are utilized incredibly well. From the discovery of the poisoned water, the discovery of several dead bodies around the village, and the events of the church involving a possessed member of the village brutally mutilating others before turning the same act on himself, this is all graphic enough to be a worthy cause to start the inquisition around the rest of the village. These scenes are quite enjoyable as there’s the mad and aimless witch-hunt trying to corral those that they deem to have proffered the incidents without cause, leading to some tension and plenty of close calls as they go throughout the area trying to find her which makes for a lot of fun while stuck back in the old days.
When it shifts back to the modern-day storyline, the revelations that have been learned about the real town curse and how it’s affected everyone which unburied quite a lot of impressive story-telling here, the film manages to inflict some rather enjoyable action throughout here. Focusing on the race to the mall where it all started and enacting the plan to stop the multitude of killers that appear to stop them from carrying out an end to the curse, this section of the film is action-packed and has tons of fun chasing, numerous confrontations through the .building and a grand conclusion to everything that uses the action to conclude the storyline in a fun fashion. These aspects are more than enough to hold this one up over its mind flaws.
This one doesn’t have a lot of issues but they are somewhat distracting. The main problem here is the somewhat uneven amount of time spent on the various timelines here since the distribution is quite uneven. The stuff from the past, which represents the discovery of the curse that’s been affecting the town, is immensely cliche and predictable without much in the way of any kind of originality. The attempts at persecution and setting the curse into motion in the town are nothing new from dozens of other witchcraft efforts and make this segment feel far too long for its own good, especially since the rest of the series never had these issues which tends to downplay the start of the film. For the most part, this is the biggest factor against this since it’s a fun conclusion overall.
Overview: ****/5
An enjoyable if somewhat flawed conclusion to the series, the fact that some of the series’ biggest issues come from this entry makes it the lowest even though as a whole it still manages some impressive aspects. Give it a look if you’re determined to finish the series if you’ve been on board to this point, looking for a fun mainstream genre effort or curious about the style from the other entries, while others who aren’t fans of the previous entries or turned off by the style here should heed caution.
This review ran as part of our 2023 Women in Horror Month celebrations. Click the banner below to check out the rest of our month-long celebrations including various reviews and interviews:
Comments
Post a Comment