The Conjuring Last Rites is suppose to be this big emotional goodbye to Ed and Lorraine Warren but man it really feels like the movie is trying way too hard to make you cry instead of making you scared or more like this is passing the crown to her daughter but not really, at the end a few weeks latter they play the "Take Two" card and reveal its not over and they working on a spin off. This thing runs for two hours and fifteen minutes witch is just insane when you think about what we actually get, the first hour drags like crazy because were stuck watching Judy Warren and her boyfriend Tony do relationship stuff when we should be watching demons terrorize the Smurl family. I get that they wanted to make this personal and emotional since its the final movie with the Warrens but doesnt work that way, this is a horror movie about people fighting evil spirits not a romantic drama about some couple who met six months ago and now they want to get married. The movie does have some very creepy moments scattered around especially when it leans into that dark corner stuff from the first Conjuring where you know somethings there but you cant see it yet, that infinity mirror scene with Judy trying on wedding dresses was pretty cool to make it to the cover of this posts and the opening with Lorraine going into early labor because of the demon was intense too so yeah there are some cool moments and its the only reason I gave it a 7 and not a 6. But those moments get buried under all the boring family drama and by the time Ed and Lorraine finally show up at the haunted house you have already been sitting through an hour of filler content that nobody asked for, plus the CGI gets way too crazy in some parts and it takes you right out of the experience.
- IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt22898462/
- Platform: AppleTV+
Rottentomatoes Rating
The movie starts back in 1964 with young Ed and Lorraine Warren checking out this antique shop because the owners father killed himself after he said something was following him around. Right away Lorraine who is very pregnant with Judy feels this presence coming from this creepy mirror and she decides she was gonna help whatever is trapped inside it, witch seems pretty condescending if you ask me like telling a demon you are gonna help it is probably not the smartest move but hey they were young I guess. The thing gets pissed off, the mirror cracks and it throws Lorraine into early labor right there in the basement while Ed is nowhere to be found because he just left her alone down there with a damn demon. The hospital scene is actually pretty horrifying because the baby comes out stillborn with the cord wrapped around her neck and you can see this demon crawling on the walls watching everything happen, I hope they were most specific to identify that specific demon as they have done before with Valak, it takes a full minute for the baby to start breathing and Lorraines begging God to bring her back but you gotta wonder if it was God or the demon that actually made that baby come back to life, sounds creepy to posses a newborn I KNOW I KNOW!!!. After that we get this long montage of Judy growing up and shes got the same psychic abilities as her mom but maybe even worse because she is constantly seeing visions and they keep trying to block them out with this stupid nursery rhyme, I have to say it felt cringe every time she show up repeating it over and over, weird we have seen Judy on other movies but I dont recall she saying this rhymes.
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Then we jump to 1986 and meet the Smurl family whos living in this tiny house in Pennsylvania with like eight people crammed in there including grandparents and multiple kids. One of the daughters gets this giant creepy mirror as a gift for her first communion and the grandfather says he got a really good deal on it because the guy just wanted it gone, witch is always a red flag right there if you have been watching horror movies for a while. The mirror is already cracked from when Lorraine touched it back in 1964 and their dog hates it immediately witch is another huge red flag because you always trust the home dogo when they dont like something new in the house. The hauntings start right away with candles blowing out by themselves and then the entire ceiling collapses on the girl, the ceiling part I felt was a bit drastic to be honest almost killed her right away, if this movie was focused properly Heather the daughter would have been the main character until the Warrens showed up but thats not what happens at all, something like on the first Conjuring movie. Instead we keep cutting back to the Warrens and Judy and her boyfriend Tony who nobody cares about, we find out Tonys an ex cop who quit after he almost got shot in the face and now he is dating Judy after six months and already bought a wedding ring witch is insane. The Smurl family stuff is actually pretty creepy when the movie decides to focus on it, there was this scene where one of the girls goes into the pantry to hide and then later this creepy demon lady is just standing there holding that doll and smiling at her in broad daylight. The problem is the movie keeps jumping between the two families and it makes everything feel disjointed and messy, you never get to stay with one story long enough to actually feel scared.
Father Gordon from the first movie shows up to help the Smurl family because the church wont do anything and Ed and Lorraine are semi retired because of Eds heart problems. He goes to the house and starts blessing it with holy water and everything seems fine until he gets to the basement and the holy water starts burning on the stairs witch means shits about to get real bad. But then the movie does him so dirty because while he is waiting at the church to talk to some elders about getting official help the demon attacks him, the cables in the hallway start moving and the woman he was talking to just disappears and then his crucifix catches on fire and the demon makes him hang himself. I was like really they killing Father Gordon in the final movie??, I really thought things would ramp up after that but nope we gotta slow it back down and watch Ed give Tony a tour of the artifact room and have them play ping pong. That whole birthday party scene feels like its from a completely different movie and it just kills all the momentum, keeps creating this gaps between the getting to know family aspect to the horror part of the movie, on a horror movie you either get the audience trying to figure out the dark psychology behind it or just keep them scare but dont give me that much room to breath and turn on the lights. The artifact room scene is stupid too because Ed keeps telling everyone not to touch anything but then we know how that went couple of movies ago, if these objects are so dangerous then maybe keep that room locked up and secret instead of giving tours during your birthday party, keep them on a secure house something like that, secret place.
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Eventually Judy starts having visions and she feels like somethings calling her to Pennsylvania so she just goes there by herself witch is the dumbest thing ever because when youre connected to evil spirits maybe dont follow the weird feelings you get. Ed and Lorraine find out and they drive down there to get their daughter and that is when they finally agree to help the Smurl family, Lorraine walks into the house and immediately feels the evil presence and she figures out there is three spirits there including some farmer guy who killed his wife and her mother with an axe back in the day. The house is built on what used to be their farmland and the mirror is somehow connected to all of it but the movie never really explains how any of this works, like why is this demon so focused on Judy specifically and what does it actually want. I was expecting some big data dump where they why and when the demon got focus on Judy but nope keep it for another spin off or sequel, the movie just stays vague the whole time. Meanwhile the Smurl family is still getting terrorized and one of the daughters starts puking up blood and mirror shards after the garbage truck compacted the mirror on trash day but then the mirror just magically reappears in the attic later with the same crack and everything witch makes no sense. How did it get back there and why didnt anyone notice it before, also that girl who was vomiting blood seems totally fine the next day like nothing even happened witch is ridiculous because she should have been in the hospital for weeks.
Even though Im a fan of the franchise I just hate how movies with the Warrens end, its all about the love for each other and all demons will be defeated, give me a talisman, a task, a rite something that is shocking. The hole exorcism rite was too much of the same and to make things worst then we get this long wedding scene where Judy and Tony get married and there was a bunch of cameos from people in the earlier movies including James Wan the director, Ed gives Tony the keys to the artifact room like he is passing on the family business witch makes me think they are setting up a spinoff with those two and I really hope they dont, but they did, that was the whole plan, never to end the franchise, I really really hope this doesnt turn into a Fast & Furious like. Lorraine tells Ed about a vision she had of their future where they grow old together and become grandparents and keep helping people over the phone, then the movie shows us what actually happened to the real Ed and Lorraine with Ed having a massive stroke at 74 and dying five years later and Lorraine following at 92. At the very end there is a disclaimer that says the mirror in the movie was actually from a completely different case where some guy was using it in rituals to summon spirits, so the whole thing with the Smurl family and the mirror was just made up for the movie witch is pretty generous considering how much they changed from the real story and I dont mind, Im here for the entertainment but there is a limit, if they wanted to make up the Judy stuff Im fine with it but stick to it. Now its well known and how exactly feels, like the Warren exaggerate their own cases to sell books and movie rights. Then again Im here to watch a horror movie and if they have focus more on the Smurl family and added Judy as her mothers sidekick and skip the entire boyfriend wedding thing could have been way better, now Im not saying I hate the movie its just my personal preference but I do feel like Ed and Lorraine didnt seem focus on the case and is the reason why they look like rushing out, not like in the other movies.
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