Movie Review
Review Annabelle : Creation
"Annabelle: Creation" is a prequel to "Annabelle", the doll from "The Conjuring". And you've probably heard that this is better than the first a lot already.
"Annabelle: Creation" has no business being this good. Funny enough, the same can be said about 2016's "Ouija: Origins of Evil". It is strange that these two bizarrely similar films were released within a year of each other. Both follow up on terrible first films. Both are prequels of those terrible first films. Both shouldn't have been made. Both are extremely effective horror films. Oh, and both star the excellent child-actor Lulu Wilson. The similarities don't even end there.
The Mullins aren't the family they once were. In the early 1940s, Samuel and Esther (Anthony LaPaglia and Miranda Otto) lost their 7- year-old daughter, Annabelle (Samara Lee), in a tragic accident. As they were still grieving, Esther was seriously injured and has been bedridden ever since. Samuel is only a shell of the happy and loving father and husband he once was. Nevertheless, 12 years after losing their little girl, Samuel and Esther decide that it's time for some good-deed-doing. They open their large farmhouse to six girls and their caregiver, Sister Charlotte (Stephanie Sigman), when the orphanage where they lived closed. The girls range in age from about 7 to 17. The two youngest girls, Linda (Lulu Wilson) and Janice (Talitha Bateman), who wears a leg brace, are especially close, promising they will never allow themselves to be separated. Although they still hope to be adopted, all the girls love their new home. Yet there's still something "off" about the house – and it gets off- ier as the days go by. Samuel is kind, but gruff and the girls are basically afraid of him. They also wonder about his wife who rings a bell when she needs her husband and never leaves her room. Naturally, the orphans are curious about their new home and they're anxious to explore. As most of them run and play outside, discovering a dark sealed well in the process, Janice tries to enter an upstairs bedroom that Samuel sternly tells her is locked and never to be opened. Of course, strange sounds begin emitting from that room (at night) and when Janice approaches the door to investigate, she finds it unlocked. She enters, looks around and finds a creepy porcelain doll sitting in a chair inside a closet that is wallpapered with pages from a Bible. Janice closes the closet door, but it keeps opening on its own. A ghost-like figure from inside the closet approaches Janet, but then disappears. The scares just build from there and Janice becomes convinced that there is a demonic presence in that room and it wants her soul. She's not wrong.
The bar is low when it comes to horror film scripts. Even the best of the genre still have the occasional cringe-worthy line or plot hole (The Conjuring 2, I'm looking at you). All this to say, I'm going to go easy on the faults of Annabelle: Creation's script. The writing here is not bad by any means. There are cringy lines here and there, but that is to be expected. The characters make extremely poor choices, but even that is to be expected. The problem rests almost solely in the dull first 30 minutes of this film.
One of the oddest things is when someone does get killed, the Nun still keeps them in this house. At that point I felt like screaming "No, you idiot. Get the hell out, run away now."
I did like the setting of the film. The middle-of-nowhere concept is a real favourite of mine in horror movies. I also found the acting to be above average, especially when you consider a large number of the cast were child actors who can often come across very poorly. Lulu Wilson, who starred in another prequel-to-a-prequel (last year's Ouija: Origin of Evil) that received generally positive reviews, turns in a solid performance as the young Linda, who must contend with the haunting presence of the Annabelle doll manifesting itself into her best friend Janice. Wilson powers her way through any questionable character choices solely on the strength of her work. On the other hand, Talitha Bateman, playing the polio- afflicted Janice, handles her character's progression nicely, turning into a genuinely chilling presence as the film progresses.
The thing I think most people have to remember about this film, which I sometimes forget myself, is that Annabelle is just a doll... creepy looking, but just a doll nonetheless. She's not like Slappy or Chucky, where the doll is the soul in and of itself. The doll may act as a conduit for the demon however; we have known this since The Conjuring. However, this demon can also do it in its own form, or into a human, or anything else that it wants to... even more than one place at a time. Makes it kind of strange that Annabelle still remains the highlight of the film by the title, but these films are less about the doll and more about the entity, and that's fine with me. I just have to keep reminding myself that.
If you are a fan of horror movies and especially if you want to see some continuity with The Conjuring series, then this is definitely a must see movie. But if you are one of those people who do not like supernatural horror movies, then it would be best if you avoid this one. By the way, the movie had 2 post credit scenes. So you can wait and see them by waiting till the very end.
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