Starring: Linda Cardellini, Jaynee-Lynne Kinchen, Roman Christou, Raymond Cruz, Tony Amendola, Patricia Velásquez
Distributor: Roadshow Films
Runtime: 93 mins. Reviewed in Apr 2019
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‘The Curse of the Weeping Woman’ is the sixth film set in the ‘Conjuring’ universe, the series of horror films inspired by the escapades of paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren, shepherded into existence by Australian horror maestro-turned-blockbuster filmmaker James Wan. After two ‘Conjuring’ movies, two ‘Annabelle’ movies and last year’s ‘The Nun’, this latest effort is easily the least connected to the other films, linked only through the character of Father Perez, who appeared in the first ‘Annabelle’ spin-off. This time, directorial responsibilities have been handed over to Michael Chaves, who makes his feature-length debut after making his name with his horror short, ‘The Maiden’. Chaves’ vision here is grim and moody and he’s ably abetted by Linda Cardellini in the lead, though his efforts are undercut by a by the numbers story and decreasing returns on its attempted jolts.
The setting is Los Angeles, 1973. Anna (Cardellini) is a widow juggling the upbringing of her two kids, Samantha (Jaynee-Lynne Kinchen) and Chris (Roman Christou), with a busy job as a social worker. Anna is on a standard call-out to check in with an agitated Latin American woman called Patricia (Patricia Velásquez) when it becomes clear that her two young boys might be the victims of abuse. Though Patricia blames their injuries on a malevolent force she refers to as “la Llorona”, her boys are taken into the custody of Child Protective Services. Later that night, the boys are found drowned in a nearby river, though Patricia has an ironclad alibi. Anna brings her own children along to the crime scene where she has been called to identify the bodies, and while they are left unsupervised in her car, an evil presence presenting as a deathly white woman, clad all in white with black tears streaking her face, latches onto Samantha and Chris.
At the funeral of Patricia’s two children, Anna meets Father Perez (Tony Amendola), whom she asks about “la Llorona”. Perez tells her the centuries-old tale of a Mexican woman who murdered her own children in a fit of jealous rage before drowning herself. Now known as la Llorona (Marisol Ramirez) or the Weeping Woman, her ghost walks the Earth searching for children to claim as her own. Though Samantha and Chris seem absurdly quiet on the subject (seriously, neither child appears to have a suspicious bone in their bodies), Anna begins to see la Llorona around her home and she eventually returns to Father Perez for help. It’s about an hour into the film then that Father Perez finally puts Anna in touch with lapsed priest-turned-curandero (a Spanish word describing a native shaman), Rafael (Raymond Cruz). With Rafael’s help, Anna prepares to defend her home from the wrath of the Weeping Woman, who will stop at nothing to sink her rotten fingernails into Anna’s kids.
From the start, the screenplay from Mikki Daughtry and Tobias Iaconis is riddled with lapses in logic, which should feed plenty of ammunition to those who like to spend their horror films yelling things like ‘Why would you enter that pitch-black room!?’ at the screen. Neither Patricia’s boys nor Anna’s kids ever care to make much of a big deal about the demonic woman haunting them to their mothers, let alone other authorities (Chris literally writes off his encounter, which left him with actual burns on his wrist, as him just “imagining things”). No one in the movie is seemingly capable of hearing a creepy noise and choosing not to investigate, nor of flicking on a light when undertaking an exploratory foray into a dark room. Characters display a flagrant disregard for their own safety, making terrible decisions when it might help to put them and others in jeopardy. This is a problem shared by many horror films, but the generic plotting of this entry in the storied genre (see: children in peril, a maternal figure fighting back, more carelessly employed religious explanations and iconography than you can poke a crucifix at) throws these nonsensical, plot-driven character choices into stark relief.
That said, Chaves does solid, occasionally stylish work with the script he was given. He does his utmost to make ‘Weeping Woman’ a moody, atmospheric film, filling his Los Angeles with shadows and storm clouds. He and his DP Michael Burgess light one early set piece in pale green, another in red. He uses slow-motion to lend weight to emotional or sombre moments. His camerawork and editing favour long takes, like the busy, slice-of-life introduction to our leading family, the camera weaving around their home as bodies rush through the frame getting ready for school and work. His scares too are quite languidly paced, using long build-ups to load their final payoff with extra shock factor. However, this modus operandi does soon become transparent, robbing them of some of their power toward the end; horror nuts might find themselves longing for more fake outs or build-ups that don’t immediately offer the relief of a jump scare, as seem to be in vogue in critically revered recent horror films like ‘Hereditary’ or ‘The Witch’.
When the titular terror is working, though, la Llorona gains much of her threat from the guttural reactions of Linda Cardellini, who proves a savvy choice in leading lady. Her maternal qualities have long seen her cast in the “wife” role in films ranging from ‘Avengers: Age of Ultron’ to ‘Green Book’, and her caring instincts as an actress supercharge Anna’s concern for her vulnerable kids. Chaves puts a lot of trust in her too, gifting her with a couple of long, artfully blocked sequences that see her roaming her home in search of strange noises or the like; Anna might have an inexplicable predilection for performing her ghost hunting with as many of the lights off as possible, but Cardellini is more than up to carrying viewers’ attention through even the most illogical series of choices.
The young leads sadly aren’t as good as Cardellini, but it feels like the blame for their shortcomings should be largely apportioned to Chaves’ direction and Peter Gvozdas’ editing. Their big scenes feel more piecemeal than hers, less natural, more a sum of disjointed shots than one continuous, real-time sequence. In one instance, Jaynee-Lynne Kinchen’s Samantha is outside, splashing in puddles and playing with her umbrella, when the Weeping Woman rears her ugly head. At first, she hears her crying but cannot see her. She is perturbed but this immediately fades, and it’s not until she catches glimpses of la Llorona through the translucent canopy of her umbrella that she totally freaks out. She is understandably shaken, but by the next shot, when she is required to walk after her umbrella as it is slowly blown away from her by precise gusts of wind, there’s no sign of any fear. It really undercuts the power of these moments, which could have been a great source of tension. Elsewhere, Tony Amendola and Raymond Cruz acquit their roles as exposition machines well, with the latter bringing an impressive gravity to a role that frequently borders on absurd. Anyone that can deliver a line like “Your pool is now filled with holy water” with po-faced sincerity is worthy of recognition.
Wan recently announced that he would be passing the keys to the third instalment in the central ‘Conjuring’ franchise to Chaves, presumably on the strength of his work on ‘Weeping Woman’. Wan clearly saw something that he liked in the director, and it was in looking for and finding these flashes that I most enjoyed ‘The Curse of the Weeping Woman’. It’s the backbone of the film, the screenplay, that feels flimsiest. Passing the torch of the ‘Conjuring’ films, a series of which I count myself a firm admirer, to Chaves is a risk (Wan’s sure direction made the previous two instalments an utter thrill), but even with its flaws, ‘Weeping Woman’ suggests that Chaves might step up to the plate with enough confidence to swing for the bleachers. No need to weep then.
Callum Ryan is an associate of the Australian Catholic Office for Film & Broadcasting.
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