Director
Corin Hardy

Stars
Demián Bichir, Taissa Famiga, Jonas Bloquet and Bonnie Aarons

Whoever said that ‘less is more’ should have had a chat with the studio heads that greenlit the idea of turning a sub-plot from The Conjuring 2 into a feature film. The idea might have been good in theory, but after two attempts to come up with a winning screenplay, it should have been obvious that there just wasn’t enough meat on this bone.

Created as a prequel to The Conjuring series, this is a re-emergence of the demonic nun, Valak, who had made per presence known to Ed and Lorraine Warren (Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga) in The Conjuring 2. Unfortunately, the character that was quite effectively scary in the previous film becomes almost comical in its stand-alone feature.

An origin story (of sorts), The Nun takes us to 1952, where an American Nun and a Mexican Priest (with an Irish name) are sent by the Vatican to Romania to meet up with a French-Canadian villager (Frenchie) and investigate the suicide of a nun at a secluded Abbey…which used to be a medieval Duke’s castle. Seems legit so far. Frenchie takes our Vatican mates out to the Abbey, where he had come across the body of the recently deceased nun. When they get there they are told by an old ninja….aka the Mother Superior…that they cannot talk to any of the nuns until the morning as they were about to complete evening vespers, followed by a vow of silence until sunrise. Obvs that means that they would have to stay the night in a place that makes Castle Grayskull look positively cosy (how convenient). Naturally our old French-Canadian mate gives a bit of ‘yeah, nah, think I’ll head back to the village and pick you guys up in a couple of days’. I think it goes without saying that our Priest and Nun didn’t receive a turn-down service, great night’s sleep and a continental breakfast in the morning. There was a little bit of demonic stalking, some hallucinations, a lot of panto vibes…”it’s behind you”, and my absolute favourite; a killer soundtrack that let you know every time Valak was lurking by playing the same ominous, chant-like riff….essentially the demonic-nun version of the “duuuun-duuun” from Jaws. Scary? Not so much. Hilarious after a while? Most definitely!

Through the unintentional comedy, there were a few moments that got you jumping, even if the frights were entirely predictable. Unfortunately the film felt like a wasted exercise. Whether it was through lazy writing, directing, or both, the movie felt like it had been phoned in. There were so many plot holes and details skimmed over that it was hard to really know what we were supposed to be investing in.  As an origin story, it was definitely lacking in ‘origin’.  The story of the basis of this demonic possession was about a 45 second detail in the film, which didn’t make a hell of a lot of sense (pardon the pun). The carelessness of it is disappointing as it shouldn’t have been difficult to have raised this to the levels of some of its predecessors. Unlike The Conjuring which has a rich story to intensify the terror that was unfolding, the story of The Nun is weak, and it’s that story weakness that lets it down in all other areas.

With the creepy setting and the launching pad from The Conjuring 2, this should have been a smash. But what was a nice little addition to the franchise in its smaller dose, became a lethal injection in this iteration.  As the saying goes, less is definitely more, and in this case, Nun would have been better! (sorry, not sorry)

2 stars

Trailer
THE NUN

Moviedoc thanks Roadshow Films for the invite to the screening of this film.

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