The Nun

Year: 2018
Director: Corin Hardy
Cast: Taissa Farmiga, Demian Bichir, Jonas Bloquet, Bonnie Aarons


Plot: A priest and a young novitiate travel to Romania to investigate a nun's suicide at a mysterious abbey there, and encounter the evil demon Valak.


Review: The Nun is a spin-off film from The Conjuring 2, where that film's villain, Valak first appeared. This film examines the origins of the demon dating back to 1952 in Romania.

Director Corin Hardy (The Hallow) does a solid enough job in making The Nun a thrilling ride for mainstream horror audiences, but he doesn't quite have the touch of James Wan. Wan knows how to set the mood for a terrifying experience and how to chill your spine with his visual skills. Hardy adopts a different approach where he throws one scare after another towards the audience, and thankfully a lot of them are well earned. But some of them are a bit predictable, and he relies on the darkness element a bit too frequently. The opening sequence was well done though.

As for the cast, they are convincing enough for the most part. Taissa Farmiga (Vera's younger sister) gives Sister Irene the right balance of youth, innocence and courage to solve the mystery even at great risk to herself. She fares better than Demian Bichir, whose Father Burke is the textbook troubled priest seeking redemption after a failed exorcism. Bichir is good in the role, but the role itself could have been better written. Jonas Bloquet plays Frenchie, a villager who brings the duo to the abbey and becomes their defacto sidekick, and the defacto humor element, which he pulls off quite well, I must say. Speaking of humor, The Nun has a bit more of it than Wan's Conjuring films, as the latter movies take themselves much more seriously.

Aside from being less scary than Wan's films, The Nun suffers from a few unexplored subplots and lapses in logic, though you'd probably be having so much fun you wouldn't notice them. If they get to make a sequel to this film, perhaps some of these subplots can be explored further.

As it stands, The Nun is best described as an exciting horror theme park ride rather than a really good haunted house experience at the park. Much like last year's It remake, it's a lot of fun, but not as scary as it ought to be. (7.5/10)