Conjuring : Sous l'emprise du Diable

Not hating on the movie and I'm actually glad they moved away from the haunted house formula, injecting a bit of other genres like criminal investigation but even though it's well paced, there's less of those nail bitting moments i love from the series. The cast still deliver the goods and the story, despite having a few weak spots was still engaging, but with far less memorable moments compared to the previous chapters.

It's 1981. The Warrens (Patrick Wilson, Vera Farmiga) are participating in the exorcism of a boy named David Glatzel. It leads to the case of Arne Johnson who claims that The Devil Made Me Do It.

I noticed early on that there is limited tension in this movie. I figured out that I don't care about Arne and nothing will happen to the Warrens since this is a prequel. I don't know any of these new people. Once Arne is in prison, I also realized that the legal system would never let him go. The Warrens can't prove this stuff in a court of law. It all culminates with the realization that this story is more a courtroom drama than a horror. This is not scary. As a horror, it is a stale by-the-coloring-book movie. It has nothing inventive or compelling. The supernatural becomes a series of random superpowers. I still love the Warrens but this is a bland superhero movie.

It's a different Conjuring, trying and innovating, not only in the story (no haunted house here) but also in the use of camera/direction, where we feel that we have a new director and with a different identity (good).

The scaries don't work as well as in the first two films and the new characters aren't as intriguing as The Nun or Annabelle, so, even if we still have very strong horror moments, we don't feel the same tension as we felt in the previous two. The Warrens do, once again, a fantastic job and I loved some references to The Shining or A Nightmare on Elm Street.

Personally, I still think the 2nd is the best Conjuring by a large margin (scarier, frenetic, fantastic direction, editing, atmosphere, London). The first one isn't as scary as the second, but it's really well executed with a very strong plot. This one is the weakest, but it's still interesting to see the couple in a different type of story and it's still a pretty solid horror film.

As I said, the film doesn't have the same power and unique feel as Wan's 2, but it is a nice continuation in the franchise with an intriguing story that does delve into the crime drama genre along with giving us the scares we come to know. You can tell Wan still was involved with certain camera works and scare concepts much like he was with the mediocre yet entraining curse of LaLlarona which this director Michael Chaves debuted on. While he doesn't fill Wan's shoes at all, he was able to follow a certain format for this particular franchise to move forward though at dragging pace at times.

The actors are all very good as usual and the duo of Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson as the Warren's are phenomenal bursting with emotion as always. They carry this film completely. The effects are decently executed and the cgi looks near flawless. Some of the scares are a mixed bag of ambition and some are tremendously cliche, but they all do their jobs for the horror aspect. The ominous settings are fantastic and add rich environment for the frights to flourish.

Overall it's an effort that felt satisfying to see the premier franchise continue, but there's a definitive void without Wan's genius eye.

I watched the conjuring: the devil made me do it last night (25.5.21) at a special pre-screening and it is A very good film. It's also different than the previous haunted house conjurings and goes for the possessed murder case (similar to the exorcism of Emily rose) but this is better.

I really enjoyed it and hope for more conjuring universe movies (the crooked man)