"The first Conjuring, released in 2013, was a profitable hangover from the previous decade's Omen, Amityville and Exorcist retreads, goosing 21st-century audiences with things-going-bump-in-the-night tricks copped from comparable 1970s theatrical and TV movies. Yet despite sequels that went big (2016's The Conjuring 2, converting the Enfield poltergeist saga into a 4DX-ready theme-park ride) and then sideways (2021's true crime-adjacent The Devil Made Me Do It), the series' underlying mechanics have proved stubbornly resistant to change."
"The current multifaceted horror renaissance makes this an apt moment for the franchise to exit stage right; facing these upstart punks, the generally sluggish Last Rites presents as something akin to dad-rock horror, doing with jump-scares what Status Quo used to do with power chords. One selling point that these films are character- rather than carnage-driven now seems to be a liability."
The Conjuring launched in 2013 as a profitable revival of 1970s-style supernatural scares, using familiar theatrical and TV-movie tricks. Sequels expanded spectacle and theme-park intensity, but the franchise's core scare mechanics remained largely unchanged. Last Rites returns to Ed and Lorraine Warren in 1986, framing them as conservative, reassuring exorcists facing an antique mirror portal and domestic melodrama. The film emphasizes character and nostalgia over visceral innovation, favoring beige soap-opera buildup and conventional jump-scares. Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga deliver steady lead performances. The result satisfies an audience seeking non-extreme horror while appearing out-of-step amid a more adventurous horror renaissance.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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