The Nun II (2023)

Sometimes it is annoying to see a film that seems intent on playing out exactly as you think it will. I wasn’t a fan of The Nun, considering it a prime example of the worst content you sometimes get in modern horror movies, so I had very low expectations for The Nun II. As the end credits rolled, I tried to decide whether or not this was worse or better than the first film. Ultimately, I think it is on a par with it. That is not a good thing.

The plot is annoyingly simple. The demon nun is back, moving away from where she was supposedly defeated in the last movie, and potentially hiding in the body of some innocent pawn. Sister Irene (Taissa Farmiga) is tasked once again with facing off against the malevolent figure. She has a potential ally in young Debra (Storm Reid), and is also reunited with Maurice aka Frenchie (Jonus Bloquet).

Directed by Michael Chaves, who seems to be the person to go to when you want someone to helm a less-than-stellar entry into the extended Conjuring cinematic universe (having also given us The Curse Of La Llorona and The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It), this is a prime example of how to mishandle atmosphere and scares. The script, written by Akela Cooper, Ian Goldberg, and Richard Naing, isn’t good, but the material is translated from page to screen with no idea of how to maximise the impact of any moments. There’s even one great potential scare, making use of magazines on a large stand, that is undermined by the mistiming of the jump scare that you know is due to come along towards the end of the sequence.

Farmiga does as well as she can, having to base her entire performance around the idea of looking worried while holding on to an inner strength, and both Reid and Bloquet just about manages to overcome the weak material given to them. Suzanne Bertish also manages to make at least some kind of impression while everyone else blends into one mass of potential victims to be terrorised by the scary nun (played once more by Bonnie Aarons, who again gives a commendable physical performance under the make-up).

While fumbled scares aren’t appreciated in a film supposedly designed to scare viewers, there’s something worse about how silly and careless the third act feels. The film becomes so ridiculous that every main beat becomes genuinely laughable when it’s supposed to be getting more intense. 

I racked my brain to think of any more positives, from the production design to the score. Sadly, nothing else managed to stand out in a good way. This is lazy, unscary, and completely pointless. I am already praying that we don’t get a third.

3/10

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M3GAN (2022)

If you want to stay up to date with the latest funky memes and social media trends then you need to see M3GAN (which stands for Model 3 Generative Android). For better or worse, it is a film that feels designed to immediately inject itself right into the heart of popular culture. It’s also another film that feels strangely in line with some major blockbusters from last year, riffing on a theme that has started to become more and more important to film-makers who have seen their medium constantly threatened by videogames, new tech that makes it easier for everyone to be able to make their own movies, and VR, among other things. But, first and foremost, it’s basically a “killer doll” film.

When her parents die in a tragic accident, young Cady (Violet McGraw) is put in the care of her Aunt Gemma (Allison Williams). Gemma has a busy workload, tasked by her boss to make a cheaper, but just as popular, version of their hit toy, which is basically a more advanced type of Furby. On the down low, Gemma and her team have also been working on M3GAN (and, yes, I will write it out in that form every time I mention her name), a “toy” that could sell at a much more expensive price point, but would also be THE toy that every household would want. Struggling to balance her work time and her responsibility to Cady, Gemma decides to pair her niece up with M3GAN. The android is designed to be comforting and supportive, and will help children learn as they play, but Gemma immediately starts to use it as a substitute for her own presence. M3GAN will keep Cady safe, but she starts to adjust her parameters as she realises how many different people may threaten to break the strong bond between them. There’s gonna be some killin’.

Directed by Gerard Johnstone (only his second feature after his horror comedy debut, Housebound), and written by Akela Cooper (who previously helped to get the madness of Malignant onscreen), this is a strange blend of sci-fi, horror, and black comedy that feels like it could have leaned further into any one of those elements, but may have been kept in a more centralized position by the likes of Jason Blum and James Wan (two people who, love or hate them, know how to turn a movie into a big hit). I wasn’t sure how to take things in the first half, the plotting and dialogue aren’t great, and every set-up is blindingly obvious, but I was won round by about the halfway mark. Whatever the genre blend is for any scene in the second half of the movie, the emphasis is on fun.

Williams and McGraw are okay, but it’s hard to judge them fairly when the script treats them so poorly. They are secondary characters, as the title would suggest, and not enough is done to make viewers fully invest in them. Amie Donald performs the physical side of M3GAN, while Jenna Davis provides the voice, and these two are the best performers in the movie, bringing to life a creation that is realistic and unnerving, even before she becomes a threat to others. Ronny Chieng is a decent enough boss who the film-makers want us to view as a potential villain, Brian Jordan Alvarez and Jen Van Epps are two work colleagues who help to build and test M3GAN, and a few other people appear in roles that set them up as obvious potential victims.

A good soundtrack and clean visuals, up until the grand finale anyway, as well as a good selection of special effects, also help to make this a decent watch. It could have been trimmed down a bit, and it certainly could have gone even wilder with the potential for carnage, but I like what is here. I also like the commentary on our relationship with modern technology, and the potential danger of leaving children too long with their devices/toys (a danger that has been ongoing since concerns were raised about letting the TV be the main babysitter).

I liked this enough to look forward to whatever might come next. I would suggest M3GAIN for the sequel title.

7/10

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Malignant (2021)

There are some things to consider about the conversations people have been having about Malignant, the latest horror movie from James Wan. First of all, the fact that it is a very divisive film isn’t necessarily a negative. Whether you end up loving or hating this, kudos to Wan for taking such a huge swing with it. Secondly, someone having a different opinion of it does not mean they didn’t “get it”, even if the film has a lot in there that will be recognised mainly by older horror fans who are more likely to spot the many influences, from giallo to grindhouse films. Third, you can enjoy a movie without loving absolutely everything it does. Despite what the internet may be telling us, reactions still do not have to be absolutely weighted to one end or the other.

Now we can get to the film itself. Annabelle Wallis plays Madison Mitchell, a woman who starts to experience visions of violent murders. Knowing a bit too much, and the victim of an attack herself, the police start to consider Madison as a suspect, especially when it turns out that she has connections to the victims. Does this mean that Madison’s childhood friend, a presence nobody else would ever see, has reappeared?

Although it’s not just Wallis onscreen, with supporting turns from Maddie Hasson, George Young, Michole Briana White, it’s a film that stays so focused on her character, and people are asked to act in a certain way, most of the cast are secondary to the vision of Wan. Simply there to be puppeteered, ironically. It’s hard to judge people for performances that have been directed in a very specific way. Although Marina Mazepa deserves a special mention for her outstanding physical performance.

The script, written by Akela Cooper (from a story thrashed out in conjunction with Wan and Ingrid Bisu), is pretty terrible. It’s the combination of bad writing and weak acting that has led to so many people saying that Wan has delivered a wild American giallo, but that claim forgives a lot of mis-steps. There’s no style here good enough to feel faithful to the giallo flicks it wants to emulate, a lot of it overshadowed by horribly unnecessary CGI, and the bonkers ending is disappointingly telegraphed from the earliest scenes (and giallo fans will know that most of the maddest endings they have enjoyed have been anything but predictable).

As inevitable as the final act is, it is also where Wan pulls out all of the stops and presents an audaciously fun sequence that makes the whole film worth your time. Perhaps that is a sign that he is more at home wallowing in gore and carnage than trying to be stylish and homaging giallo flicks, but it certainly allows him to provide nods, some bigger than others, to the works of Frank Henenlotter, Stephen King, Brian De Palma, and his good friend, Leigh Whannell. I don’t mind this pick ‘n’ mix approach when the end result is such a hoot, and nobody will feel bored by the time the end credits roll.

Malignant is good, sometimes really good, but the first hour or so isn’t. You have some disappointingly weak death scenes, characters it is hard to really care about, a score from Joseph Bishara that doesn’t really work alongside the visuals most of the time, and constant overuse of CGI when practical effects would have added to the overall feel that Wan was aiming for. That final act makes up for a multitude of small sins, however, and how far it pushes the envelope towards real cinematic insanity makes it one of the strangest horrors to be pushed into the mainstream in a very long time. Which makes it worth your time and support.

7/10

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