‘THE CONJURING: LAST RITES’ Review: A Final Farewell Boasts Scares, Spooks and Ghouls Galore

Courtney Howard // Film Critic

THE CONJURING: LAST RITES

Rated R, 2 hours and 15 minutes

Directed by: Michael Chaves

Starring: Vera Farmiga, Patrick Wilson, Ben Hardy, Mia Tomlinson, Elliot Cowan, Kíla Lord Cassidy, Beau Gadsdon, Rebecca Calder, Molly Cartwright, Tilly Walker, Orion Smith, Madison Lawlor

THE CONJURING: LAST RITES brings the decade-spanning series, its real-life paranormal experts and its director back to fine form in its final farewell. This fourth chapter, centered on the Warrens’ toughest case ever is a spooky, creepy, unwaveringly unnerving fright fest of freak-outs. Even more shocking, it acts as a loving tribute to familial perseverance. For every scare, there are double the sentiments instilled into the story that get us to care about two families’ survival. Filled with earned emotions and sinister horrors that lurk in the dark recesses, it’s a celebration of the inspired collaborators who’ve contributed to its creation and curtain close.

In 1964, twenty-somethings Ed (Orion Smith) and a pregnant Lorraine Warren (Madison Lawlor) investigate a possessed cherub-covered antique mirror when crippling labor pains abruptly halt their process. After a complicated birth, their daughter Judy arrives into the world healthy, albeit touched by the dark side. Over the ensuing years, Ed (Patrick Wilson) and Lorraine (Vera Farmiga) teach Judy coping techniques to fend off malevolent manifestations distressing her daily life. Only Judy’s (Mia Tomlinson) anxiety from these grotesque visions become far too frequent to ignore once she reaches her twenties and gets engaged to boyfriend Tony (Ben Hardy).

As one happy family grows their brood, another family discovers a festering evil that seeks to tear their strong bond apart. The Smurls – dad Jack (Elliot Cowan), mom Janet (Rebecca Calder), teen sisters Dawn (Beau Gadson) and Heather (Kíla Lord Cassidy), and twin sisters Carin (Tilly Walker) and Shannon (Molly Cartwright) – are a blue-collar, multi-generational Catholic family living in West Pittston, Pennsylvania. On the eve of Dawn’s confirmation, her grandparents gift her with – you guessed it – that possessed antique mirror, which unleashes Hell, wreaking havoc on the entire household. Tormented and bedraggled, the Smurls implore the church and the media for aid, but to no avail. When Judy catches wind of the dire circumstances, she and her retired parents are compelled to help.

After the previous iteration, THE CONJURING: THE DEVIL MADE ME DO IT, fumbled hard by not delivering basic franchise fundamentals, it’s heartening to see director Michael Chaves’ follow-up righting those wrongs. He and writers Ian Goldberg, Richard Naing and David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick (working from a story by Johnson-McGoldrick and producer James Wan) return to goosebumps-giving haunted house antics, wisely pivoting away from the previous feature’s woeful witchy workings. From the set up of the playful pantry game to the eerie crawling Susie toy and later freeze-frame pause on a videotaped event, tension-fueled sequences are masterfully crafted.

Suspense, coaxed out with the greatest of ease, holds just long enough to achieve maximum seat-squirming screams. Figures tucked away into the home’s dark corners also serve up spine-tingling chills. The filmmakers don’t hold back depicting the traumatic terrors the real Smurls were dealt, everything from hearing rapping on the wall or demonic whispers (which earn the sound design team top marks) to the more disturbing occurrences like seeing their dog thrown into a wall (the dog lives!). Projectile vomit and bloody glass bits also serve to make the audience nauseous. Practical and in-camera effects are utilized with skill and smarts.

Outside of the fear factor, the filmmaking quartet make the family aspect soar. Those thematic ties are in constant dialogue with the atmosphere and aesthetics. A Terrence Malick-inspired montage in act one, showing Judy growing up, surrounded by her parents’ love, warmth and safety, is a glorious chorus of cinematographer Eli Born and editors Elliot Greenberg and Gregory Plotkin’s work. A ping-pong match between Tony and Ed, set to David Bowie’s “Let’s Dance,” gives both characters rooting interest and binds us closer to the evolving family dynamic. The third act climax isn’t necessarily the Big Action Set Piece where good inevitably  faces-off against evil, though that is absorbing. Rather, it’s the scene after that’s insular, intimate and poignant. Farmiga and Wilson’s performances remain the heart and soul.

That’s not to say the film is perfect. Pacing tends to be a bit of an issue as the narrative gets stuck toggling back and forth between its tenderness and terrors. Storyline tracks feel segmented, needing greater finesse to integrate both together in every scene. Plus, it takes a long time and a handful of repetitious story beats to finally get to where we already know we’re heading.

Overall, however, THE CONJURING: LAST RITES is a celebratory send-off to a series that began with such promise and is now graciously allowed to end on its pathos.

Grade: B

THE CONJURING: LAST RITES opens in theaters on September 8.