Annabelle (2014) Review
We’re in week #2 of my review series through The Conjuring universe. Today I’m going to be talking about the second film in the franchise, Annabelle. What did I think about this film? Is it any good? Let’s talk about it!
The Review
I went into this film hearing that it wasn’t very good and one of the weaker films in this franchise. Its Rotten Tomatoes score was a 28%, in regards I went expecting a pretty average possibly bad film. After having seen the film, it’s a pretty below average horror film. I don’t think it’s totally dreadful, this isn’t one of the worst horror films ever made. But it’s a totally generic and forgettable film that leaves no mark, no impact whatsoever. The 28% on Rotten Tomatoes is lower than what I would rate the film, but that still doesn’t mean that this is a good film.
What’s frustrating about this film is that they went from James Wan directing The Conjuring. The Conjuring being a great horror film that’s thrilling and exciting to this film, that’s totally generic and bland. They got so much creative talent behind the camera with James Wan. In front of the camera they got Patrick Wilson and Vera Ferminga. For Annabelle they got John R. Leonetti directed it. His films have an average Rotten Tomatoes score of 16%, 30% being his highest score. The script is written by Gary Dauberman who wrote both of Bill Skarsgård’s IT movies, two films that I really enjoy. In front of the camera they got Sebastian Stan’s new girlfriend. It felt like they put all of the eggs and resources into making The Conjuring great but did nothing to make Annabelle a good film.
I think all of that shows when you watch this film. Everything down to the story, the characters, the thrills, and more is totally generic and adds nothing to the film. The story is because this pregnant woman gets haunted by this creepy doll who wants to take the soul of her baby. That’s the plot of the film and it’s just as generic as you’d expect. This film does nothing new or interesting with that idea. What made The Conjuring work is that Wan took a familiar haunted house plot but added in great direction and characters to elevate it. That’s not the case for Annabelle, they started with a totally generic and bland story and added generic characters, scares, and locations. There’s nothing interesting about the characters, you don’t remember their names or anything about them. The performances are so bland, they don’t do anything to try and elevate the material. The “scares” are pretty weak, most of the scares come from somebody walking around in a house and something scary happens. They keep on recycling that scare tacktick over and over again. So after a certain point in time the scares become predictable and don’t mean anything. I don’t wanna sound like a broken record but this film is so generic and bland. It’s not even an interesting movie to talk about, because it’s so forgettable. Even writing this review after I watched the film does me no favors because you forget about the film as soon as you finish watching it.
As far as the Annabelle doll, I didn’t find that there was anything interesting to do with it. There’s this interesting idea presented in the third act of Annabelle trying to take the soul of a new born baby. On paper, there’s something horrifying about that idea but the film does nothing with it. It’s this last minute idea thrown in there that if the entire film was about that. You had this dread of Annabelle at any moment and could take possession of this baby and we don’t know when it’s going to happen. The other piece about it didn't make sense and maybe I missed this, but it felt like they only kept the doll so the plot could happen. Early in the film, the wife realizes that Annabelle is the one doing all of these creepy things but the wife still decides to keep the doll and we don’t know why. It felt so weird that you’re clearly traumatized by this doll yet you won’t get rid of it. Even parts of the film felt lazy because they didn’t have a good script that brought all of this stuff together.
Final Thoughts: This might not be a super exciting review (I apologize about that if that’s true), but this isn’t a super exciting film to talk about. It’s not bad, I don’t think this is one of the worst horror films ever made but it’s totally generic and bland. There’s nothing new or interesting that this film does to make it stand out. When they got a guy who wrote really good horror films but a bad director. We’ll see how this one ranks with the other films in the franchise.
The Score: 7.6/10 (C)
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