Review of Ouija: Origin of Evil (2016) by João Miguel R — 14 Jan 2017

It's better than the first one. Not a very great compliment since the first sucked, and I feel that's the only reason why this one got such great reviews. There is no reason this film is worthy of anything over 70% on RT, all it is is decent, and it is in no way comparable to The Conjuring 2.

The plot is predictable, it's the characters that are somewhat fresh. The kid actor is uniquely creepy all on her own, though the movie has to up the ante by creating unnatural occurrences which therein spoils the movie as a whole. The turning point where the demon or whatever inhabits the kid is such a terrible scene, and looks stupid. Aside from visually being stupid a lot of the time, the demon/kid teleporting wherever and whenever is stupid and contains a whole new set of problems with the story. It's inconsistent and lazy, but at least this is mostly contained in the final act. The moment that really raised my awareness to the film's stupidity was when the teen boy who was sort of dating the teen girl out of nowhere hanged himself from the second floor. Preceding the scene he was alone in the basement with the demon/kid, so I'm left to assume she teleported him up there and made him hang himself, which irritates me so much I'm not even going to get into it. Later on when the demon/kid is going all out on the "terrorizing", the boy who hanged himself grabs the girl and throws her onto the stairs. Here's what is stupid about it: the boy comes alive for just a moment for no reason (which doesn't make any sense) and the rope HAD to have elongated itself for just a moment to allow the boy to grab the girl as she is running away for no reason (which doesn't make any sense). At this scene I literally laughed out loud because it was that stupid, but immediately following that scene was the demon/kid teleporting to the bottom of the stairs to look eerily up at the girl resting there. Then the demon/kid, instead of just running up the stairs, climbs onto the wall and sideways-crawls up at the girl laying on the stairs. Forget how tired stairways are as a tool used in horror movies for people to unnaturally climb them, there is no point in deliberately not using the stairs and climbing onto a wall, it is literally more work to do to attack the girl, it is so stupid and I hate it because I know it is only used for the purpose of unsettling the audience BUT IT DOESN'T BECAUSE IT'S STUPID. Ugh.

The beginning half saves this movie from being a total piece of crap like the first one, with a nice build up around the family and their lives as well as delivering the rules of the Ouija game in a way that doesn't hammer the audience over the head with their importance.

Ultimately it's another predictable and mediocre horror film with a solid first half that splutters off into a wimpy finale.