Movie Review: The Conjuring

I absolutely flat out hate most movie critics. I hate that they are so out of touch with what most people enjoy. And I REALLY hate when they don't view movies as they were intended to be viewed. South Park: Bigger, Longer, & Uncut is certainly no Casablanca, but it's not trying to be. I feel like a lot of critics don't get this, and so would never give South Park the same number of stars as Casablanca because the latter is a cinematic treasure while the former is full of gross-out jokes and politically incorrect. When, in fact, the South Park movie is hilarious and (FOR WHAT IT IS) is very well done.

So, I decided that I am going to do my own movie reviews from time to time on this here blog. The movie theater by our house does $5 Thursdays, so I am already seeing plenty of movies (how can I turn down a $5 movie ticket?!). And when Joe starts school, I'll probably be seeing a lot more because I'll be lonely and bored. Womp, womp. At least this way I can justify the $5 a week habit ;)

A couple of notes before I begin:

1.) Since new movies come out on Fridays and the day our theater charges $5 is Thursday, my reviews for new movies will be about a week (or more) late. Deal with it ;)

2.) It doesn't take a whole lot to impress me. You may want to automatically subtract one or two stars from my reviews because I am easily amused.

3.) I really hate action movies, so you're unlikely to ever see a review of an action flick.

4.) I really love horror movies, and therefore they will probably be favorably and often reviewed.

Alrighty, with that business taken care of, I'll launch into my first movie review.

The Conjuring 
9 stars out of 10

Okay, so I already admitted to being a horror movie buff. But I have a confession to make. Lately, they haven't really been doing it for me.

Maybe I'm just a little burnt out on the genre, or maybe it's because I've been watching them at home and I never pay attention at home the way I do in the theater.

Whatever the case, I wasn't excited about The Conjuring coming out. It was barely a blip on my radar. Despite it having the dude from Office Space, I had relegated it in my mind to future Redbox rental.

But then Wednesday came, and I realized that the next day was $5 Thursday so I had to see SOMETHING. I looked at what was playing, and checked IMDB to learn a bit more.

That's when I saw that The Conjuring had an 8.1 out of 10 on IMDB. Say what?! Modern day horror movies NEVER get 8's (at least, none that I can remember). It's the classic case of people not viewing them AS THEY ARE SUPPOSED TO BE VIEWED and thinking they are supposed to be cinematic masterpieces.

I was highly intrigued, and my Thursday flick was picked. Joe, of course, did not come with me (he hates horror movies about as much as I love them) so I was solo. Which, to be frank, kind of enhances the spookiness of going to a scary movie. When I got home today and shut the front door of our 100-year-old+ apartment building behind me, I definitely got the chills and rushed up the stairs to Joe and Buster.

But I digress.

The Conjuring is one of the better horror movies I've seen. Like, ever.

It's like Amityville Horror meets Exorcist.

With The Conjuring you have a family who moves into an old farmhouse and creepy things start to happen to them. You also have a demonic force that wants to possess someone and can only be stopped by an expert in exorcism.

Despite the fact that both haunted house and possession stories have been done to death (pun intended), The Conjuring built excellent suspense and delivered serious scares. I really didn't think at this point I could be scared of a haunted house movie (possession, on the other hand, always freaks me out - I am Catholic after all), but I was definitely wrong.

***Side Note*** So wrong, that I'm wishing I waited until daylight to write this post, because I will certainly NOT be able to leave the safety of my bed now that I am replaying scenes from the film in my head. Guess my bladder will have to stretch. ***End of Side Note***

I do think this could be a cheesy movie if you weren't in the right mood for it, since basically every single horror movie trope is present. But it's just done really well. I also particularly liked the amount of time spent on scares/suspense - I'd say for about 60-70% of the movie there was SOMETHING creepy on screen (or about to be). Too many scary movies nowadays are 75% exposition and then there are a few scares and an anti-climatic climax and then the movie is over. Definitely not the case here.

My recommendation - go see it! It's a fun movie theater movie especially if you have an audience like mine (a lot of screams). Or, wait for Redbox and watch it at home in the dark. If you can, you are braver than me.