A kid had to face the world in his own animated version and conquer life's biggest monster. ANI (The Harvest) It's as if a child's imagination is a safe haven, a place where the world is a playground for all the possibilities the mind could think of. And even the tight and humble space called home, situated on a busy Metro could not hinder the inquisitive headspace of a young Mithi (played by Zyren Dela Cruz), a boy who accomplishes the day by playing with his colorful toy robots that perform a vital role in his imaginary narrative. With a loving father and a mother that sings him a self-assuring lullaby, Mithi is blissfully unaware of the harsh reality. But life decided to toy with his fate, and Mithi's perfect little world is now showing its cracks, putting his vulnerability to the test and slowly depriving him of his happiness he thought would last forever. And through his eyes, the world suddenly transforms itself into a menacing monster. Set in a lush ...
As far as I remember, The Conjuring universe hit its final nail in the coffin with the abomination that is 2018's The Nun. A movie so sloppily executed that it drowned itself with its own stupidity.
However, as we know in Hollywood or in any business, if it prints money, then there's absolutely no reason for them to stop continuing this seemingly yearly hit-or-miss offerings.
Sure enough, with this year's upcoming Annabelle: Comes Home, James Wan, the producer of this conjuring franchise, definitely proves that there are still enough tricks left under his sleeves, waiting to be greenlit to a fully realized film as an expansion to the already popular horror movie universe.
Downright Silly
Despite the lack of originality, Michael Chaves' The Curse of La Llorona, the latest entry to the Conjuring universe, has enough spooky peekaboos that worked even with its downright silly narrative.
At this point, it's very obvious that this expanding franchise uses a very formulaic template bootstrapped from one movie after the other and thus provides this very familiar tone and cinematic style as we watch it unfold before our very eyes.
In La Llorona's defense however, what sets it apart is that it's more focused than its other sister movies, largely due to the influence of this real-life Mexican folktale. The cultural representation in this film is quite an entertaining material to watch but I thought could've been utilized more effectively than it already did.
Chaves successfully used what worked with the other Wan films and took it as an inspiration, or rather, a blatant copy-and-paste storytelling with a foreign reskin.
But is it watchable? Well, yes.
Regardless of the stupidity especially when it comes to the characters' decision making and some horribly written scenarios, this film was well paced and well executed. I also thought that the rare jumpscares were effective and satisfying especially if you're a fan of this every-movie horror trope.
I thought the way they handle La Llorona's apparitions were creative and helped in boiling a scary buildup as you await the next big boo-yah.
In addition, the acting performances in this film, particularly Linda Cartellini's, are also great and helped sell this otherwise rehash of a film.
The cinematography and color grading also helped spawn a 70's feel to it, as it was intended based on the story's time period. Other than that, there's not much new stuff that this film had offered that the other horror flicks already did and probably better.
Let's Be Reel
La Llorona's strengths were clearly not its narrative. If anything, there are a plethora of better films that operate on the same story as this one.
Despite the flaws, I thought the film was enjoyable — a horror-101 fun house of childhood ghost stories and cultural folktales.
Overall, The Curse of La Llorona is not so bad after all. If you liked the first Conjuring then I am pretty sure that you will definitely like this one.
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