The Curse of La Llorona (2019) Warner Bros./Horror RT: 93 minutes Rated R (violence and terror) Director: Michael Chaves Screenplay: Mikki Daughtry and Tobias Iaconis Music: Joseph Bishara Cinematography: Michael Burgess Release date: April 19, 2019 (US) Cast: Linda Cardellini, Raymond Cruz, Patricia Velasquez, Jaynee-Lynne Kinchen, Roman Christou, Marisol Ramirez, Sean Patrick Thomas, Tony Amendola. Box Office: $54.7M (US)/$123.1M (World)
Rating: ** ½
In Mexican folklore, La Llorona (“The Weeping Woman”) is the ghost of a beautiful woman who drowned her two sons after her husband left her for a younger woman. Legend has it that great misfortune befalls those who hear her cries. It’s said that she kidnaps wandering children at night and drowns them like she did her own. There is no evidence that the events that inspired the tale actually happened, but it makes for a hell of a scary ghost story, one that parents in Latin American countries use to keep their kids from staying out too late. If only The Curse of La Llorona lived up to the legend.
It’s been suggested on more than one occasion that I set my standards too high when it comes to horror movies. It’s true, I admit it, but can you blame me? Have you seen the sorry state of horror in the last 20 or so years? There have been a few good ones- e.g. The Ring, Freddy vs. Jason and It Follows- but most have been crap. Although part of the Conjuring universe, I had no reason to expect The Curse of La Llorona to be any good. I mean, the trailer for The Nun looked promising and look how that turned out. I figured The Curse of La Llorona would be mediocre at best. It looked like the same-old-same-old with its CGI effects, manufactured jump-scares and sudden loud noises. I’m pleased to say it’s a little better than mediocre.
Director Michael Chaves, making his feature film debut, kicks things off by briefing us on the legend of La Llorona (pronounced Yor-oh-na) in a prologue set in 1673. The action then jumps ahead 300 years where we meet widowed mother Anna (Cardellini, Green Book) and her two young children, Chris (Christou) and Sam (Kinchen, Self/less). She’s a social worker who’s asked to check on the welfare of two boys that seemingly disappeared. It turns out the mother (Velasquez, The Mummy Returns) locked them in the closet for their own protection. Anna, believing the mother to be insane, takes the boys to a shelter where they’ll supposedly be safe. Within hours, they’re found drowned in a river.
The distraught mother, who blames Anna for her sons’ deaths, wishes the same on the well-meaning but spiritually clueless social worker. It isn’t long until La Llorona sets her sights on Chris and Sam. Anna goes to the church (Catholic, of course) for help. The priest (Amendola), the same one from 2014’s Annabelle, refers her to Rafael (Cruz, Alien: Resurrection), a curandero (native healer or witch doctor) better qualified to deal with this sort of thing.
I grew up on 1980s horror flicks. In high school, there was nothing I liked better than spending a weekend afternoon at the cinema watching scary movies. Even crappy ones like The Power, The Prey and The Final Terror were kind of fun. The Curse of La Llorona comes closer to recapturing the spirit of B-level horror movies than almost any I’ve seen in the new millennium. At a cost of $9 million, it’s low-budget by today’s standards. I can easily see it as the bottom half of a double bill. While better than expected, it’s NOT a new horror movie classic by any stretch of the imagination. It has a few genuinely eerie scenes including a zoom shot right out of The Evil Dead, but it’s not all that scary. The “BOO!” scenes are completely predictable; you know they’re coming before they come. Once again, it’s proven that volume does not a scary scene make. Making a scene louder does NOT guarantee the viewer will jump higher. When will filmmakers figure this out? The CGI effects are just that, CGI. In terms of quality, it’s neither good nor bad CGI; it’s actually fairly standard. The same can be said of the plotline. We’ve seen this story before. The only real difference is that it taps into Mexican folklore which is a good thing since people of Latin-American descent have long been underserved by the horror genre. If only The Curse of La Llorona was a better movie.
Chaves brings genuine atmosphere to The Curse of La Llorona even if it doesn’t always feel period authentic. It’s set in the 70s, but it doesn’t have the same 70s feel as the two Conjuring movies or Ouija: Origin of Evil. I blame the CGI; that can be a real disconnect at times. As for the acting, there’s not a whole lot to say. The actors play their roles fairly convincingly. Cardellini looks sufficiently terrified as she attempts to protect her young from an evil entity. It’s believable when she jumps into fiercely protective mode. Perhaps the nicest thing I can say here is that there’s not a single bad performance among the cast.
That The Curse of La Llorona is better than mediocre is a gift. It could have easily sucked like so many recent fright flicks. I’m always glad when one of these movies gets an R rating. Horror is an R-rated genre. Watering it down for a more teen-friendly PG-13 defeats the purpose. I say always go for the R. That being said, I’m not entirely sure exactly why The Curse of La Llorona is rated R. Maybe it’s because young children get killed. Oh well, I guess it doesn’t really matter. The movie knows its intended audience and serves up enough thrills to make it worth the price of a matinee ticket.
