The Conjuring universe has been close to the standard for horror for about the last decade. It just added its third feature to the original Conjuring making it a trilogy, but there have also been other spinoffs from the original and sequel like the Annabelle franchise, they also had The Nun, and La Llorena. All these movies were decent, they have had a drop off recently, and the third Conjuring definitely took a precipitous decline from the other two. I went into this film extremely excited, but ultimately left extremely disappointed and not scared.
The film revolves around Ed and Lorraine Warren's continual investigation into the paranormal, specifically demons, but in this case, it seemed more like a crime investigation of a cult. It starts with the exorcism of David Glatzel, an 11-year-old boy, while this is happening, Arne, Debbie Glatzel's boyfriend, offers to be the new vessel for the demon if it will leave David, so he now becomes infected. Shortly after this, Arne commits a murder and at the trial, he becomes the first American to plead not guilty due to demonic possession. So Ed and Lorraine had to go searching for clues as to who cast this demon onto the family. While doing this they get the help of a former priest who helped bring down a famous cult. Eventually they gather enough clues to figure out where the person was who was conducting these rituals and the final confrontation ensues, but ultimately Arne is still convicted of his crime.
So to compare this film to the previous two, as I said, it does not really compare. This film they tried to broaden the scope more and made it more of a true crime horror than a demonic exorcist type horror. It also did not help that James Wan was not the one directing the project as he had been on the previous two, and he has quite the reputation for making great horror movies. The other two focused in mainly on one house and driving the horror out, but this went from place-to-place gathering clues and information. Also the witch who cast the demon onto the family was not scary, and she was the main antagonist. Whereas in the other one you at least get the scary nun or some creepy people in the basement or crawl space. There was no memorable scare like the hand clap in the first one either. Normally after watching these movies, there is some sense of fear and anxiety at night.
One of the funny disclaimers they have at the beginning of every Conjuring movie is that it is based on a true story, which the words based on, are too strong of descriptors for the reality. It would be closer to say the story is “inspired by” or 1% factual. In this case, there allegedly was an exorcism of a boy, and the boyfriend did supposedly take the demon from the boy, and then the boyfriend proceeded to murder someone, and they did plead not guilty due to possession, but after that everything in the movie is made up. So that is like the first 15 minutes of the movie, and maybe the last 2 minutes of the movie. There was no witch hunt, there was no body found in the lake/reservoir. Also the whole thing of Arne being possessed in the prison and being tempted to commit suicide was not true either. The movie also made it seem like Arne received a reduced sentence due to his possession, but he served a shorter sentence due to his good behavior in prison, it had nothing to do with the possession. Later on, the family would come out and say that the Warrens told them this could be a huge money making opportunity and to go along with it. This is also alleged. So when it comes to these based on true story movies, they should be taken with a mountain of salt because most of it is embellished and fictionalized.
Also it seems important to point out that if these events did occur in real life that the Warrens would probably have gotten in serious trouble for their destruction of evidence or even accused of murder. There was the time where they broke into the morgue and were messing with the dead bodies, so if the bodies needed to be examined, they would not be in the same condition, which would be tampering with evidence. Then when it comes to the final showdown Ed destroys the whole shrine where the demon was summoned, so the police would not have gotten the chance to see it and know that some ritual had taken place. Not to mention that the witch that cast the demon onto the family would be found dead in these tunnels under a house, and the only people present were Ed and Lorraine. The witch was killed by the demon who was promised a soul and did not get one, so the demon took the witch instead. This leaves the Warrens as the sole witnesses to this dead body, and if the court did not accept the defense of possession, they surely would not accept that this body just crumpled due to a demon.
The Warrens also seem to come off as hypocrites in this film, specifically when they go to visit the pastor who took down the cult. The pastor collected like all the cult memorabilia that was left behind, and he kept it in his basement, which inevitably led to his daughter's demise in becoming a witch. The Warrens when they visited said that he should have burned all the stuff instead of trying to keep it protected in his basement, and this is where they become hypocrites. If you have watched the other movies, you know that the Warrens have a whole museum in their house where they keep their relics of past possessions. The museum is even open to the public, and if one is to believe legend, someone mocked the Annabelle doll and got into an accident on the way home. So in a way they are venerating these relics and allowing people to come see them, which seems not much different than what this other guy was doing. And it caused his daughter to take the wrong path, so it just as easily could have led the Warrens' daughter to do the same.
Sadly the other two movies are so much better than this one, that I cannot even recommend going to see it, if you like horror and going to the theaters and have already seen A Quiet Place Part II, then go see it, but it really was not that good. The scares were sparse, and the story was not that interesting. I only hope that if they continue the Conjuring universe, that they get back to what made them good. A solid blend of good story telling and jump scares. I also hope they give the Ed and Lorraine pair another attempt at a good movie, so that they can end their chapter as good as they started. If their home museum has any indication as to how many stories they can tell, they should have plenty to choose from. I give this movie a 79.
New Ratings
Conjuring 3: 79
Harry Potter 1: 80
Harry Potter 2: 80
Harry Potter 3: 80
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