Annabelle
By Robert Benoit Updated: October 21, 2014
One of the interesting notions in this recent resurgence of horror films is the overt sense or complete lack of originality. We’ve endured a near decade of remakes, spinoffs, and reinterpretations of pre-existing material.
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History has shown that audiences will flock to the theatre for a night of Friday terror as long as the film tagline reads, “Based on true events.” If it happened in real life, it has to be scary right? Annabelle is a sure fire example of this type of advertising. In all actuality, it’s a fictional origin film based on a real doll that may or may not have been possessed (if you believe in the supernatural) with concepts from both “Chucky” and “Rosemary’s Baby.”
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Was this film really necessary? I guess if you look at the box office receipts compared to Annabelle’s budget, it appears so. However, was it an amazing film? No. Well, was it a terrible film? Again, no. It was just okay. A nice, safe, complacent, decent, okay film. Now I’m being rather kind here, but that’s only due to the parts of this film that actually were quite effective. Sadly it was all within the first fifteen minutes of the film.
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Annabelle opens with the beginning of The Conjuring, a film directed by James Wan (Saw and Insidious), to remind you that it’s about that doll from that scary movie you saw last year. This segment is almost the film’s way of telling you: “Oh! Don’t forget to see The Conjuring Two!” Otherwise, it felt extremely unnecessary to splice this piece in. Also focusing on the doll’s face to scare the audience isn’t creepy.
After this scene, we meet the happy family that’s going to be haunted by Annabelle. It is made evidently clear that this is an origin story, thus we start in the late 60’s. Now this was a time famous time for notorious serial killers such as the Zodiac Killer and Charles Manson (not so subtly mentioned on television in the film) wandering about the United States, causing fear and paranoia.
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Mia Form (played by Annabelle ‘what a coincidence’ Wallis), who is pregnant with her first child, living in a happy cul-de-sac with her husband, John (Ward Horton). And what does John get Mia on this fine evening? The world’s scariest doll that nobody in their right mind would want, that way she can add it to her extensive collection of dolls.
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As the two lovers turn off the lights and head to bed, the camera pans into the house next door where a man breaks in and murders their neighbours ‘the Higgins.’ Now this to me was the most terrifying sequence in the film because it wasn’t supernatural, but this felt like a real and visceral scenario that wasn’t forced. The murderers break into Mia and John’s home, instilling the audience with legitimate fear because this realistically could happen. The police arrive and rescue the family from the intruders but not before the female assailant kills herself.
The female assailant is revealed to have been the daughter of the Form’s neighbours that ran away from home, before joining a satanic cult. Now this is where the audience understands who the person possessing the doll is, Annabelle Higgins. Pregnant woman fears for her and her child’s life as a result of an occult ritual, I told you it was essentially “Rosemary’s Baby.” Mia Form’s name is actually nearly identical to the actress who played Rosemary, Mia Farrow.
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It is after this sequence that the film treads in it’s own lack of ideas and creativity with a concept that didn’t need a feature length film for itself. The rest of the film will involve camera pans to show apparitions of Annabelle’s ghost, the Annabelle doll moving around, the stove turning on by itself, and Mia seeing demonic things: all to try and scare the audience.
Mia Form as the film's protagonist, Annabelle Wallis.
Click the image above for the original article on Knice Creative.
One part in particular frustrated me beyond comprehension was the inclusion of a creature that, I can only assume, was supposed to be Satan. It ended up, to me anyways, appearing as a lazy attempt to give the Lipstick-Face Demon from Insidious his very first cameo. The director painted it black and dropped it in the film hoping it would scare the audience. What’s worse is the demon this time was CGI, which yanked me out of the film by revealing a clearly rushed idea.
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This isn’t to say that Annabelle was without aspiration. There were some fascinating views of the times that were brought to light if ever briefly: the role of women as mothers and racial equality in the form of Evelyn (Alfre Woodard). I need to mention that Woodard is hands down the best actress in this film, showing a great deal of range with the vague role she’s been given. They have a brilliant African-American actress during a time where racial equality was still an issue. Therefore, I thought that the writers would take mention of this. They didn’t. In fact, they had Evelyn go out of her way to care for the rich white family and concluded the film with a final sequence that is rather offensive. If you saw the film, you know what I mean. Another implication is Mia’s role as the women who cried wolf. Nobody believes her experience and it could’ve been viewed as a statement of the mother who is overreacting from post-pregnant hormonal adjustments. After this initial mention, it isn’t developed more. The writers decided that typical horror film fodder would do and getting too deep in meaning might be too much for the audience to think about.
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What the writers simply couldn’t accomplish in character depth and conceptual thought, they tried to make up for in sound effects and high violin scores to frighten the viewer. In the Conjuring, it made hairs stand up on the back of my neck and worked incredibly well with the on screen action. With Annabelle, it was annoying and flopped at building tension that wasn’t there in the first place.
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Annabelle in the end is another example of low budget horror flicks that cannot manage to given audiences what they expect, let alone muster up the energy to shoot for it. Jump scares fall flat and instead made me want to jump out of my seat to leave the theater. John R. Leonetti, director of all things sequels (Mortal Combat: Annihilation and The Butterfly Effect 2), had me entering with less than stellar expectations. Over the course of the film, Leonetti pans and zooms to reveal what Mia can’t see, but we sure can see it. By doing this over and over, it stops being scary after the first few times. Walking out of Annabelle, all I can hope is that Wan returns to direct the sequel to The Conjuring. One thing is for certain, he knows how to craft an atmospheric horror film that doesn’t falter in the ways that this spin-off did. Redbox it, Netflix it, but don’t rush out to the theatre because you might be disappointed.
Final Score
3.5
Annabelle's poor planning and weak writing deliver a quick cash in on The Conjuring franchise name with little to show for it.
Score: 3.5/10
Pros:
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Alfre Woodard’s performance
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Opening home sequence builds dread and atmosphere with realism…
Cons:
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…That ultimately fades to cheap scares
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Almost complete lack of originality
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CGI demon
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Ignoring the time period for effective exposition
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Sound effects unable to produce little more than annoyance
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Convoluted mess of a story