The Conjuring 2:
In 1977, Ed and Lorraine Warren, the lovable ghost-hunting couple, find themselves travelling to London to investigate a poltergeist (disruptive spirit) in a townhouse occupied by a single mother and her several children. However, this seemingly everyday haunting (and probable hoax) grows evermore angry and invasive as time goes on, and the Warrens begin to suspect a far more sinister entity is at play.
The Enfield Poltergeist, like any other case the Warrens were a part of, is one of the most debated ghost sightings/possible hoaxes ever documented, and this film milks that quite a bit. Watching the footage and photographs with the film back-to-back, the recreation is incredibly detail-accurate and many characters and locations are nearly identical to their real-world counterparts.
The leads Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga are incredibly likable and hold the movie together, while also adding in humanizing flaws the first film left out of it's borderline angelic portrayal of the couple (Ed's passion and proclivity towards anger, for example). Wilson and Farmiga are terrific and often unnoticed actors that are able to generate a lot more chemistry than seen in most horror film couples (definitely moreso than in Wan's own Insidious, which featured Wilson opposite Rose Byrne), as well as give the film a more emotional, dramatic feel. The shame is the film Warrens are so likable it makes the very real (and oft-reported) possibility the real-life Warrens were nothing more than poorly masked frauds even more upsetting.
Frances O'Connor and Madison Wolfe were very serviceable as the single mother Peggy, and her daughter Janet, the child the film pays the most attention to. Now this is no Exorcist, but Wolfe turned in a solid performance as the possessed girl, though sometimes the obviously dubbed "possessed" voice is more laughable than scary most of the time (hearing this little frail British girl speak in a gruff, Cockney man's voice is pretty amusing). O'Connor is also above-average as the single mother, who I felt a lot of sympathy for, and the fact that it's a single mother also makes the horror a lot more frightening, as this poor, stressed-out woman now has to deal with these fantastical forces she cannot hope to combat coming after her children. However, you may notice I'm using rather dull words to describe the performance of these two, like "solid" or :above-average," because frankly, after seeing this film over a month ago (that's procrastination for you), I can't really remember much about them other than being just pleased with them. Nothing to write home about. Unfortunately, that's rather routine for horror films these days.
Simon McBurney plays Maurice Grosse, another key figure in the real-life case, who at first comes off as the cardboard-cutout, bumbling paranormal investigator who seems to be in it for his own publicity, but has some more grounded moments that ultimately won me over with him. However, one character I can say was the most terribly flat, misrepresented, almost insulting character was Franka Potente as Anita Gregory, another real-world character and a skeptic of the case. Nothing against Potente, but the character is purposefully written to make skeptics look bad. She insults the victims and other investigators at inappropriate times, and seethes smugness and bitchiness from the moment she appears on screen. Her judgemental and self-satisfying smirk as she tears down the daughter's claims towards the climax are enough to make anyone despise her. But then I realized "Hold on, this is a real person. This persona really exists. And here they are reduced to a caricature." She's not even a character, she's just a tool to make the audience hate skeptics and anyone who claims the Warrens or their cases are fraudulent. Another skeptic character (portrayed by Cory English) who appears early on on a talk show opposite the Warrens, is similarly portrayed as a pompous, irritable, and dislikable man who personally attacks the duo instead of relying on science and reason (as a skeptic would).
Bob Adrian, veteran voice actor Robin Atkin Downes, Bonnie Aarons, and Javier Botet (known for his work on the REC series) round out the principle cast as the entities in the film. I will say this, for all the silly (sometimes downright laughable) moments and the reliance on jump scares, the film did a genuinely great job of building up the menace of the antagonists and really getting under my skin (Wan has a knack for this, let me tell you). While the "main" ghost I found not all that frightening (it's just a normal old man with a gruffer voice and discolored eyes, eerie? A little. Terrifying? Not really, seen it done better.), the other entities (the demon nun seen in advertising and another I won't spoil), were not a part of the real-life story but were nonetheless very effective. That nun crept into my dreams for nights after I saw the film (although, the use of CGI that sometimes accompanied it was really bad and took me out of it; I felt it was already really creepy in a refreshingly simplistic way, so having an obviously CG 'demon mouth' effect on it was just a bad call). The film's use of "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing" is not only appropriate (it's set during the holidays) but will make you shudder everytime it plays around Christmastime.
Speaking of which, the music choices are excellent. Joseph Bishara's score is, again, a little reminiscent of his Insidious work, but the soundtrack is excellent. "London Calling" by The Clash and "I Can't Help Falling in Love with You" by Elvis Presley are terrific classic rock tracks that make it into the film, the latter being used very effectively, to my surprise.
I also noticed the film makes use of the R-rating a lot more. The original's R rating was a shock to the producers and Wan, but they played it up in the marketing ("A film so scary and real it was rated R just because it's so accurate it scared the MPAA" was the gist of it), and now, they rolled with it, with some more gruesome moments (not full-on gore, but definitely bloodier than the first in a few key scenes).
Some might also find the religious angle played up in this film, just like in the last, a little off-putting if you aren't really a religious person (the heroes are Catholic and use their faith in God to help them find the courage to fight demons- it's honestly even more overt than the religious themes in The Exorcist) but I wasn't all that bugged by it.
Overall, The Conjuring 2 is a fun time getting a safe, easy scare. Is it a great movie? No. It's not even a particularly great horror movie. But it is an entertaining and fairly solid one. If it's still playing near you, go check it out if you like horror films or the paranormal investigative side of it (just don't consider this a historically accurate movie by any stretch). 6.5/10 stars.
(Image: Wikipedia)