Movie Info
Movie Name: The Curse of La Llorona
Studio: Atomic Monster
Genre(s): Horror
Release Date(s): March 15, 2019 (South by Southwest)/April 19, 2019 (US)
MPAA Rating: R
I wonder if you can get candles from a dollar store when doing a ritual…or if the ghosts care (and I bet it is frustrating when they get there early and blow them out)
Widowed social worker Anna (Linda Cardellini) discovers one of her cases named Patricia Alvarez (Patricia Velasquez) has locked her children in a closet. When the children die under mysterious circumstances in protective services, Anna finds Patricia blames her for her children’s deaths. Now, Anna’s own children Chris (Roman Christou) and Samantha (Jaynee-Lynne Kinchen) seem to be the target of something supernatural. Anna quickly realizes that Patricia’s fears might not have been unfounded, and now, Anna must save her children from the curse of La Llorona (Marisol Ramirez).
Directed by Michael Chaves, The Curse of La Llorona is a supernatural horror film that is part of The Conjuring “universe”. Following The Nun in 2018, the movie premiered in March at South by Southwest and was later released in April. It was met with negative reviews.
The Conjuring had its moments, and all of the films in the “Conjuring Universe” have had parts that good mixed with bad. The Curse of La Llorona has probably more bad than good, but still provides a couple of (obvious) jumps.
For being so old she does a decent job of keeping her whites white
The story is rather generic. It feels like the ghost story of La Llorona (a Mexican folk tale) is more interesting than the 1970s part of the story. You can see the pitfalls forming around Anna (aka getting accused of abuse, etc.), but many of the plot points fail to full develop (like the abuse storyline). It almost felt that aspects of the story should have been dropped and other areas expanded upon if they weren’t going to fully explore them. Bottom line is, the story goes where you expect it to go and there are little surprises or original moments.
Linda Cardellini is always a bit underrated, but I feel that this underrating is because she gets projects like this. While she is good in her role, the role lacks depth or the storytelling she needs to make the character compelling. She says a lot with her eyes, but it isn’t enough to fix the shallow script. Marisol Ramirez likewise does what she can with her role and is solid for what she is given. Breaking Bad alum Raymond Cruz plays the wise exorcist who sometimes comes with jokes (but all the jokes feels awkward because they don’t fit the character). Tony Amendola provides the link between Annabelle (2014) and this film by reprising his role as Father Perez.
Oh…a screaming ghost reveal…shocking…
The movie has your typical evil dead woman scares. What’s behind the door? Dead woman. What’s watching your hair? Dead woman. What’s under the water? Dead woman. The visuals are ok, but they don’t do anything new or creative with it…and the same scare over and over again diminishes the effect but visually and in the storytelling.
The Curse of La Llorona is a miss. The movie just doesn’t have the teeth it needs. I was happy it was R-Rated for some real horror, but the movie didn’t even seem to really utilize this…at least at PG-13, the filmmakers would have had to be more creative to get the scares while keeping it rated for a wider audience. The Curse of La Llorona was followed by Annabelle Comes Home also released in 2019.
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