Ouija: Origin of Evil (2016)

Sex :
Violence :
Director Mike Flanagan
Writers Mike Flanagan, Jeff Howard
Starring Annalise Basso, Elizabeth Reaser, Lulu Wilson, Henry Thomas, Parker Mack
Genre Possession
Tagline When you talk to the other side, you never know who will be listening
Country
Ouija: Origin of Evil (2016)

Review

"Do you know what it feels like to be strangled to death?" - Doris Zander

It's 1967 Los Angeles and widowed Alice Zander is raising her two daughters, 15 year old Lina and 9 year old Doris, as best she can. Money is tight but Alice is getting by via a dodgy séance business, but at least she has the girls helping out. Lina sneaks out one night and is introduced to the infamous Ouija board by one of her friends. Hasbro making a killing with what is viewed as game, though there are a few rules. So anyways Alice decides to add the board to the fun and festivities of your suburb séance, which would have been okay except Doris has a real affinity to the game.

Pretty soon Doris is summing spirits, hijinks are going down, and Doris ends up possessed by some nasty entity from the pit. Who you going to call? This time it's Father Tom, who doesn't even manage to incant a "God compels you", before its revenant time. Can Alice and the girls escape from an insane entity or will Hasbro have to issue a warning on its next Ouija game release?

Okay so I didn't see the original, the tween orientated Ouija, but waddled along to this sequel/prequel with the expectation that I would pretty much be delving into the low end of horror, CGI shenanigans aimed directory at the "want to be scared crowd", and for half the movie I was proved wrong and then the overly derivative second half kicked in and got to say I was yawning folks. Director Mike Flanagan simply lost his nerve with this one and delivered a film that will disappear from the public conscience about a week after it leaves cinemas. Let's break it down, there are some good things in amongst the dreck, but unfortunately Ouija: Origin of Evil ultimately boils down to all that is wrong with modern horror, and that includes horror review sites.

We are introduced to the Zander family early on as Mom and girls are involved in a séance that is so totally faked that I'm surprised they didn't have some Halloween decorations floating around. We soon learn that mom Alice believes they are helping people, this point becomes belaboured as the movie progresses, and it's not all about the money. Lina is rebellious and starting to question what they do, while the younger Doris is all wide eyed innocence. And that's about all she wrote, while this might appear very shallow characterisation it is enough to have us rocking through the first stanza where Director Flanagan is making an earlier decade style of a horror movie. You know, introduced the characters, get us to like them, and then drop them in the supernatural poo. I was ready to give a standing ovation through the first half of the movie and was surprised how engrossed I was with what was on my screen, including one of the best ever jump scares, you'll know it when you see it. Flanagan allows some comedy to lighten the tension before wham bam thank you for paying your ticket price, hope you don't have a heart condition.

However, this being a horror movie an all, as soon as the Ouija board makes the home crib the supernatural activity begins to insidiously inch its way into the Zander family dynamic. All kudos for this should go to young actor Lulu Wilson (Doris) who nails the cute as a button innocent becoming increasingly creepy as the paranormal starts to dig its claw in. Worth watching the movie for Doris' narrative on being strangled. Wilson sure nailed her role, I was particular impressed with her gradually move to the dark side, which by the by elicited a lot of audience reaction, Wilson does creepy like a seasoned pro; you could completely accept her deliverance to evil. Ably backing up Wilson was Annalise Basso (Lina), who pretty quickly cottons onto something changing with Doris as things gradually escalate in the freaky states. The two young actresses are really holding down the fort and I was getting comfy for a second half of gradually mounting demonic fury. And it's at about this point that Director Mike Flanagan lost his nerve and simply served up regurgitated horror tropes and more CGI shenanigans than most Marvel movies could hope to include on any given Sunday!

If you have seen movies like Exorcist 3, The Amityville Horror, yadda yadda then you have seen every trick Flanagan is throwing at the screen in the second half of the movie. Same old tired tropes are being trotted out, that only really work with young chicks, the want to be scared crowd, and teens who have miraculously never seen a horror movie before in their lives. This is one limp biscuit of a horror strategy; I was pretty much reduced to reciting which movie each new "scare" idea had been pilfered from. There's so much CGI going down here that Wheta studios would have gone into meltdown, the real stars of the second half of the movie are the computer effects wizards, for me wasn't working, zero kudos here.

We at least get some back story as the haunting, playing in a graveyard y'all, and it's a bit of a ripper though played out a few dozen times in the new decade. Ex concentration camp survivors, mad Nazi Doctor, secret lab in the basement, you get the gist? Okay so we're talking insane revenants and other darker things locked away behind a brick wall, Edgar Allan Poe style. Unfortunately by now said plot elements are pretty much tropes that have been used a zillion times before, so originality isn't a strong point here. And don't get me started on the flabby Father subplot, that played out like it had been tapped on to deliver the final scenes in the movie, before the obligatory shock post movie scene anyways.

There are some nice touches here and there indicating Flanagan was trying to present an authentic throwback experience, you'll know them when you see them, unfortunately this didn't extend to not using CGI and is pretty much forgotten about in the second half of the movie. Still two thumbs up for at least trying to put us back in a forgotten era, though the why of it is probably a tad pertinent. While on the subject the whole design of the movie recalls the late 1960s when kids were in rebellion and Ouija boards were being sold over corner store counters, it's authentic as all heck, call out to the props department!

The movie at least seem to be working for the younger crowd members in the audience, older viewers were less impressed. We had a couple of walk outs as things went chaotic, a lot of screaming from tween chicks, though admittedly that started in as soon as the first mild scare went down - want to be scared crowd, and the teenage guy across from me was moaning and hiding his eyes like a big woss. There was even a bit of cheering and clapping at the end from the younger crew. As I keep saying you have to be careful reviewing movies, they ain't all made for your demographic, but I calls them as I sees them.

Ouija: Origin of Evil is one of those movies that everyone will rave about, mainly the quote whores trying to get a listing on the disc cover down the line, but which will be forgotten about pretty quickly. The movie isn't original, had the bones to be a hell of a lot better, and really isn't going to appeal to the core horror crowd. Early teens are probably going to enjoy this a lot more than older demographics, and I guess end of day the movie is aimed at this more gullible market. As stated this movie epitomises all that is wrong with modern horror, at least the second half does, and really doesn't have a lot to offer dark travellers. Flanagan shot for the moon with the first half and then didn't have the boosters during the second half of the movie, and that my friends is the origin of mediocrity with this movie. I'm dropping surprisingly a 7 out of 10 on Ouija 2, due to the superior first half, but offer no recommendation due to the lack lustre second half.

ScaryMinds Rates this movie as ...

  Could have been so much better.