New to the box office from the producer of "Annabelle" and the writers of "The Conjuring" comes "The Crucifixion" starring Sophie Cookson, Corneliu Ulici, Brittany Answorth and Matthew Zajac. Just in time for Halloween, "The Crucifixion" tells the story of a journalist (Sophie Cookson) who has lost faith in God, investigating the story of a nun who died during an exorcism. The movie itself is nothing horror fans haven't seen before, with a few well placed jump scares, and a predictable plot with a lackluster twist of an ending, it's still worth a watch, especially for those who wish to see a new movie for the Halloween season.
'The Crucifixion' plot
The movie opens with a nun being exorcised by a priest, the exorcism is interrupted by Bishop Gornik (Matthew Zajac). Shortly after, the nun dies, and the priest and the other nuns who assisted him are jailed and awaiting trial for the murder of the nun. Enter journalist Nicole Rawlins (Sophie Cookson), who wants to travel to the eastern European country where the events took place and investigate further, hoping to prove the priest's actions led to the nun's death.
Nicole teams up with Father Anton (Corneliu Ulici) and together the pair begin to witness strange and horrifying events, making Nicole start to change her mind about God, and the priest who originally performed the exorcism.
Reviewing 'The Crucifixion'
"The Crucifixion" is by no means an original tale, nor is it worthy of the writers who gave us "The Conjuring." Nevertheless the movie is still worth the watch, if for no other reason than it's the Halloween season.
The movie attempts to offer creepy scenes and jump scares worthy of modern horror movies, however, that is an issue, they are too similar to modern horror movies involving spooky tales, and come off as expected and non-unique.
The characters are given three dimensional backgrounds, but still manage to come off as one dimensional -- especially Nicole, the journalist. In the beginning of the movie Nicole has lost her faith in God and hates anything to do with organized religion. The reason is alluded to throughout the film as something to do with he mother, and while the audience does find out exactly why she feels the way she does and what happened to her mother, you don't really understand her character, and in fact still get quite annoyed with her at times.
Father Anton is the typical sidekick, conscience, jimminy cricket-esque character with absolutely no background given, which is understandable since the movie is only a thankful 90 minutes long.
There is a subplot of some kind that never really comes to fruition, involving a young, mute gypsy boy who appears throughout the film, and who's unrealized purpose is explained and then dismissed at the end of the film.
The special effects are nothing to get excited over, which is honestly a good thing when it comes to horror movies -- too much spent on special effects and you run the risk of looking cheesy, like final reveal of the big bad in the movie "The Boogeyman."
While none of this seems to really want to drive audiences to the theaters to see it, it is still worth a watch, either streamed when it arrives on Netflix or Amazon Prime, or if you want to get out for a bit, maybe catch it as a matinee at the cheap theaters on dollar movie days.
"The Crucifixion" is by no means the worst horror movie to be made in recent years, however, it certainly doesn't live up to the talent that brought us "The Conjuring" and "Annabelle."
"The Crucifixion" was released on October 6, 2017.
