Director: Lee Cronin
Year: 2023
Country: Ireland/New Zealand/USA
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Possession
Plot:
Returning home to visit her family, an estranged daughter attempts to reconnect with everyone, which is soon turned into a struggle to escape when a resident of the apartment complex inadvertently releases a horde of demons to possess those around them, forcing them to survive.
Review:
This was a massively entertaining and enjoyable entry in the series. Among the better features here is the solid setup that provides everything with the proper context for the later possessions. Getting an in-depth look at the main family structure with their individual needs and stories, including the home-life with the mother trying to raise the two youngest in the apartment complex, the oldest daughter’s estranged relationship with her due to being out on the road with her band, and the later dynamics of the other residents who are there with everyone else at the building does come off incredibly well. As these provide enough context for everything going on, the later scenes have an urgency to what’s going on based on the early setup.
As this early setup with the characters goes along with the unraveling mystery surrounding the eventual possession and release of the demonic entities. Even though there’s no good reason to keep scouring over the book after it’s discovered, this does provide a highly effective starting point with the forced reading of the proper incantations to unleash everything, as well as the attack on the mother that signals the genuine start of the possession. This results in a series of immensely creepy and chilling scenes in the blackened building where the deranged actions and sayings on display become genuinely unnerving the longer they continue, and it all turns into a lot of fun with the way everything turns around into a highly enjoyable reveal of the possession.
That launches the film into a slew of absolutely effective and outright chilling features. After the fantastic opening showing the party getting obliterated at the lakeside cabin, the interactions back at the apartment showing the ferocity and intensity of the possessed on the family and the neighbors who come to check on them during the night provides a fantastic series of encounters as their superhuman strength, inhuman regeneration, and frenetic aggression make for a slew of graphic encounters playing nicely off the concept of maternal instincts being exploited against them. With the demons toying with the family because it’s the mother using that against them, they feature a dark and frenetic inflicting violence openly against children, making this a massive amount of fun.
The film does have minor drawbacks that emerge here. The main drawback on display is the inherent stupidity that arises to get the plot moving, with the absolutely asinine reasoning for unleashing the possession in the first place. The retrieval of the book and finding what’s inside is a major red flag not to proceed further, so the decision to keep reading from it of their own free will without outside influence just reeks of stupidity for the sake of moving the film along. Had it done something to spur him into doing it, that would’ve been understandable, but to just leave it as this is a bit disappointing. As well, there’s also the overlong finale with way too many outside factors coming into play and extending the film needlessly, but these are minor and don’t harm the film overall.
Overview: ****.5/5
A fantastic entry in a rather strong franchise, this one manages to get quite a lot to like about it, which holds it up over a few minor drawbacks to bring it down. Any fan of mainstream genre fare, aficionados of the franchise, or are curious about it will have a lot to like here, while only those turned off by these features should heed caution.
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