Review of Jessabelle (2014) by Mark W — 06 Feb 2015

Jessabelle has its moments, but there are far too few of them and for the amount that it has, they are too slow in coming. Vessels that fill with blood, reflections in mirrors that haunt a house, and voodoo-entranced residents who reside in Jessabelle's hometown all lend some atmosphere to this film but in the end this movie overextends its welcome and comes up short for the viewer.

Although Sarah Snook is believable in her role as a temporarily disabled victim of a horrid car crash who comes home to recover, many of the peripheral characters in this movie are poorly synthesized.

In the midst of her recovery Jessabelle discovers many secrets buried deep in the rooms and walls of her parents' home. Though "Jessabelle" has potential promise, its thinly veiled storyline is difficult to sustain because of a lacking dialog.

In some scenes, the appearance of new, unknown characters turn the film into a non sequitur that leaves the audience wondering "What in the world ?". It takes so long for "Jessabelle" to develop any rhyme or reason, that eventually it loses pace with itself before tripping over its own legs and falling down.

But by then you will have lost interest in watching it. In the end Garant's story develops a breakneck pace in an attempt to try and explain everything that was so confusing before. The sure sign of a bad joke is if you have to explain it.

That's also the sure sign of a bad movie.