Ivanna

Kimo Stamboel's direction brings a touch of gravitas, but no amount of blood and severed heads could save 'Ivanna' from its tacky writing. Another awful entry in an all-around awful series.

In the Indonesian movie Ivanna (2022) two young siblings are being rescued after their parents death but soon after they arrive at a new family the older sister Ambar is being haunted by terrifying visions and the whole family is plagued by a malevolent force. The fact that Ambar's eyesight is becoming increasingly worse makes it all even more terrifying for her and brings some dynamic for the plot.

The movie reveals some back plot about the past and et voilà , we have a typical "ghost on a revenge spree that is targeting the innocent" movie. But this movie gets some extra credit for some gruesome gore and some heavy-handed scenes including several decapitations and eyes popping out of the skull. The fact that the ghost or entity is so physically threatening makes up for some truly terrifying scenes that will definitely stay with the viewer for some time.

The overall pace of the movie is rather slow except for the third act where the movie turns up a notch, because of the slow paced beginning and middle part of the movie I think it could have been 10 or 15 minutes shorter, but then again the third act makes up for that. [5,9/10]

The plot works as it is. It's simple but the movie executions made up for its plot. It does waste some time to explore the "mystery" (Though from my personal experience, it's pretty predictable).

Now, the eerie/creepy moment at the start of the movie is the best part of the movie for me. Watching a headless body walks in the background with unaware characters really sells it. The atmosphere support these scenes.

The problem came with the slasher part of the movie. Without spoiling much, the movie only uses one kind of execution. Usually, one of the fun part of a slasher movie is watching how the killer creatively execute his/her victim. In Ivanna there is only one method, and it start gets boring aftering watching it done for the third time.

Overall, it's entertaining enough for me, for an Indonesian horror movie, it does a decent job.

The storyline is pretty simple and predictable. Many directors from HK or Hollywood have directed something similar over the last 20 to 30 years.

The movie relies very much on jump-scares, yet they are mainly low-quality jump-scares, e.g. Loud noises and sudden-shock. None of the thrilling experiences is memorable.

Also, with the same repetitive style of thrills - pulling one's head off + appearing here and there - it gets bored after a while. I would expect the horror experience to escalate as time goes by, but it's pretty dull and flat throughout the movie.

If this movie were released in the 1990's or 2000's, it might be great. BUT having shown it in the year 2022, I would say.. it's rather old-fashioned, dull, monotonous, and NO big deal!

I gave 2.0/ 5.0. It's just too ordinary, and pretty forgettable!

When I sat down here in 2023 to watch the 2022 Indonesian horror movie "Ivanna", I had never heard about the movie. So I only knew that I was in for an Indonesian horror movie experience, which was actually all that I needed to want to watch the movie.

Writer Lele Laila put together a fair enough script and storyline here, based on the novel by Risa Sawaswati. Not that I am in any way familiar with the novel, so I had no idea how true the movie's script is to the source material from the novel. Clearly the writer had no concept of how decay and decomposition works, especially with about 50 years passing and having a body part exposed to such a long time.

While "Ivanna" was a watchable movie, it was by no means a particularly outstanding foray in the Asian horror cinema. And for a lifelong horror afficianado such as myself, then director Kimo Stamboel's 2022 movie was a relatively slow paced trek.

The acting performances in "Ivanna" were good, and they definitely helped to keep the movie afloat. And my limited exposure to Indonesian cinema means that I wasn't familiar with the cast ensemble. Leading actress Caitlin Halderman, playing Ambar, really carried the movie quite well with her performance.

For a horror movie, then I have to say that I found "Ivanna" to be a bit on the generic side. Sure, the storyline was nice enough for a single viewing. But that is about it, a single viewing is all that the movie has to it.

My rating of "Ivanna" lands on a five out of ten stars.