Review of The Nun (2018) by Player2-Water — 15 Dec 2018

E-Value: 5.

Acting: 7.

Plot: 5.

The fifth instalment in The Conjuring Universe marks the return of Valak, the demon nun, who was last seen in The Conjuring 2 and had made two cameo appearances in Annabelle: Creation which the demon was seen in a photograph and appeared in the post credits scene as a teaser to this movie. Like Annabelle: Creation, this movie is a prequel and chronologically the earliest chapter taking place before the first two Conjuring and the first two Annabelle movies. This instalment explores the origins of Valak and its demonic activities in Romania before encountering the Warrens.

In the year of 1952, the Vatican officials have received news that a nun committed suicide in Abbey of St. Carta, Romania and assigns Father Anthony Burke (Bichir) and Sister Irene (Farmiga) to investigate the case. They travel to Romania and meet Frenchie, a French-Canadian farmer who delivers food supplies to the nuns and the one discovers the corpse of the nun.

Frenchie takes them to the abbey and show them the corpse of the nun who actually has an unknown key in her hand. After giving her a proper burial, they meet the Abbess, who seems to be unaware of the nun’s suicide. Staying at the lodging for the night and Frenchie returns home, Father Burke sense some disturbance outside the lodging and suddenly attack by a demonic entity by burying him alive in the graveyard.

Sister Irene also senses some disturbance in the chapel where she encounters the demon nun, Valak (Aarons). Realised that Father Burke is being buried alive due to her sixth sense, she manage to rescue him on time. Despite the attack, both of them stays and continue their investigation in the abbey the next day to find some answers.

This movie fell into the same trap as the first Annabelle movie. It is not scary enough like the first two Conjuring and Annabelle: Creation. The jump scares are not well utilised and can be seen as too predictable. In addition, the jump scares are totally overused more than the other instalments. The attempts at using sense of humours to lighten the mood is really unnecessary since this is supposed to be a horror movie. During the movie’s final act, I felt the tone of the movie was change from horror to dark fantasy genre which is really kind of odd.

The performance of Demián Bichir and Taissa Farmiga are pretty good especially Taissa, whose acting is good just like her older sister, Vera Farmiga, who is the main star of the franchise. The production crew should be praise for their effort to shot the whole movie in Romania instead of using other locations to make the movie more authentic. Despite this, they are not enough to save the quality of this movie. But still, the movie did connect well to the Conjuring movies. For the sake of the franchise, I hope that the next instalment do better to make up for this movie.