The third instalment in the horror franchise gives us a lot of Ed and Lorraine Warren, but not nearly enough Satan.
The third instalment in The Conjuring franchise (which has already spawned spin-offs The Nun and the Annabelle series, with another one based around The Crooked Man in the works) is the first not to be directed by modern horror master James Wan, who is well accustomed to accidentally launching lucrative horror franchises (see Saw; Insidious). It also has to overcome the hurdle of having no instantly recognisable supernatural case to solve.
The first Conjuring film focused on the real-life haunting of the Perron family, while the sequel tackled both the Amityville and the Enfield poltergeist, two of the most well-documented paranormal cases in history. All of these have had multiple screen adaptations, giving the stories of the previous films a level of spooky brand recognition that The Conjuring 3 just doesn’t have (at least not in the UK).
The real-life incident that forms the basis of this film is that of Arne Johnson, known in the US as ‘the Devil Made Me Do It’ case. The plot once again revolves around Ed and Lorraine Warren (Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga), media-friendly seekers of the supernatural, combining the tropes of the possession film with the conventions of a courtroom drama. We begin with the brutal exorcism of a young boy named David, a sequence so packed with contortionist-level body horror, references to The Exorcist, and screaming, that Ed has a heart attack.
The demonic entity moves from the boy to Arne, a young man living with the boy’s sister who soon savagely murders his landlord. The challenge the Warrens now face is to convince a court jury that the man is innocent by reason of demonic possession. The case turns more complicated, as the Warrens take it upon themselves to prove that David, Arne and even Ed himself are possessed by an inhuman entity conjured up by one of cinema’s favourite boogeymen: the Satanic witch.
I’ll confess at this point, I don’t come to The Conjuring films for the ghosts: I come for the Warrens. And on that front, The Conjuring 3 delivers. Ed and Lorraine bring schmaltz to the supernatural. A good chunk of the film is concerned with commemorating their 30-year relationship, showing how they fell in love (in a cinema!) and how much they are still in love, in spite of, or perhaps thanks to, the many encounters with occult forces they have lived through. I’d happily just watch the Warrens alphabetise their room of cursed objects.
On the horror front, however, The Conjuring 3 is lacking. The film is too committed to the jump scare; while Wan’s strength was always to let the camera linger and the audience fill in the dark blanks, Michael Chaves (whose directorial debut was the Wan-produced The Curse of La Llorona) is preoccupied with contorting bodies and distorting perception. While some of these moments are effective (especially any scene with the young possessed boy), ultimately there is no gut punch to the scares because we don’t get to know any of the characters that are being affected by the occult forces. Unless it’s the Warrens in danger, it’s hard to care.
What’s even more disappointing is that The Conjuring 3 misses the opportunity to tap into the Satanic Panic of the 1980s. The film had the potential of creating a memorable Satanic conjurer. Instead, we get mere glimpses of an overgrown Wednesday Addams look-alike. Hardly demonic business.
Published 27 May 2021
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