The Conjuring (2013)

Blame me in the name of the overly-hyped yet most-talked about film on twitter this week. I am actually a coward. It puts me a lot of courage watching ghost-themed film or anything that will potentially scare the shit out of me for days. I used to go nuts over a creaking door or the edge of the room or under the bed. I had constant hatred to the bolster too bcs it reminds me of.. you know that 'local ghost in plain white sheets'. I got terrified over the sound of sorrowly girl crying in the midst of the night though it's really just a sound of a bloody cat. Then all I could do is sleeping with the lights on or I might need a company throughout the night.

However, my curiosity conquers it all. I finally went to see The Conjuring this Thursday along with my two old friends. We felt pretty much excited because we had been tried hard to take more friends with us but.. nah they're too fainthearted.

The Conjuring (2013) 
IMDb Rating: 8.0/10
Director: James Wan
Writer: Chad Hayes, Carey Hayes
Starring: Vera Farmiga, Patrick Wilson, Lily Taylor, Ron Livingston

Some time in the early 70s, a big family of seven, Perron family, moves to an old rickety farmhouse in the suburb. During the first day,  the whole family is in delight though the dog's unusually scared rejects to come into the house. The Perrons keep busy unpacking their furnitures while the kids are happily playing hide-and-clap. Then suddenly, one of the kid inadvertently finds an entrance to a hidden cellar. Now that initiates the whole series of paranormal things. The next day and after, the terror starts happening to one another member of the family and it gets worse each and everyday. Terrifies, Carolyn Perron (Lily Taylor) asks Ed (Patrick Wilson) and Lorraine Warren (Vera Farmiga) to help them seek the problem in the house. The Warrens' investigation and research to the house's history leads to an awful discovery that afterall the house isn't really the core problem. It is the evil works that has done in the house years ago which makes it cursed. Now either The Perrons or The Warrens have to make a quick move or else someone is going to get killed.

The Review
Since I'm a diehard coward and got startled very easily, I always sheer-closed my eyes with my hands everytime the plot starts to get intense. I screamed almost the entire film too. When it's time to stepped out of the cinema, my body felt a light physical breakdown for no reason. My legs somehow a bit trembled it took awhile to self-adjust. It's weird how a film could make you 'disabled'.

The Conjuring is quite captivating--The Exorcist and The Amityville Horror combined.  I'm not gonna give comments about their acting since they did it just fine. But I was pretty astonished to see there were like tons of ghost sightings in the film and it creeped me out. There are several eerie scenes, the one that stuck in my mind is when Carolyn Perron got trapped in the cellar and heard the sound of strange claps. It's real horrifying and I can't imagine myself ever experienced the same thing. And of course, the exorcism scene in the cellar that dominates the whole film.

Exorcism scene in the cellar (Source)

And about the plot, I must say for a two-hour-ish film, it's a really good one. I got carried on with their investigation, the way they reveal one by one facts about the condemned house. Very exciting. But here's one lack of thing in the plot that I absolutely hate--the ending. It's too obviously explained and it buzzkilled the whole thing. Well, maybe it is what truly happened in Warren's case files but I see this very very very much displeased for a film, especially the horror-thriller one. An ideal horror film should ends up perplexing and make the viewers feels like shit after like, "Wtf? What the hell is happening? Why it ends up like that? Whaaat???" There, so the viewers takes their very own version of why that film ended up, it sucks but it's so much fun, isn't it ? :)

Hence, final verdict: 8.2/10

Stoker (2013)

I've watched Stoker, Shame and Prozac Nation which all were psychological themed films the past month. Things have been tied up as I've been interning at a govie treasury office in my hometown. Then I thought that the theme suits perfectly with my current life. Well it doesn't mean I have the exact same psychological problems but I can tell we share the same fundamental value. We're most definitely bored.

Stoker (2013)
IMDb Rating: 7.0/10
Director: Chan-wook Park
Writer: Wentworth Miller, Erin Cressida Wilson
Starring: Mia Wasikowska, Nicole Kidman, Matthew Goode, Dermot Mulroney

Sets in nowadays, a coming-of-age India Stoker (Mia Wasikowska) has to deal a tragic loss of her father, Richard Stoker (Dermot Mulroney) and a sudden visit of her long lost uncle, Charles Stoker (Matthew Goode). India starts smells some funny business between her mother, Evelyn Stoker (Nicole Kidman) and Charlie after seeing their frequent affection and intimacy around the house. Something mysterious is hidden inside his uncle's mind, she knows it's bad. Though Charlie keeps trying to get to know her better by cooking a dinner for India and her mother, picking her up at school, saving her lives after getting bullied and nearly raped by her school mate. But still, India has to find out a mystery behind Charlie's appearance in the family. The mystery that will change her forever. And all it takes, is the key she got from her 19th birthday present from her dead father.

Le Review

Getting bored is a dangerous state to every beings in life. It'll trick your mind to do something else, something different than you usually do. Something that pleases you. An escape from a routine, a reality. If we talk about sane people, they'll probably take a day off, go for a vacation, cherish life a little bit. However, this won't be the options for those who is mentally unstable. I mean not generally, but some of them will do for sure. Common people have boundaries of things they want to do when they get bored, while the sick.. apparently don't share the same idea. It can be worse like killing, raping, vandalizing, and all the batshits.

Talking about Stoker, it is exactly about the ugly causes of getting bored. They get bored, they're sick of having poor expectations. It turns out the other way in real life that things don't happen the way they want it to be. Hence, they will do 'something different' just like us, common people, going on a vacation. But this time... they do 'it' in their very own way. Same thing happens between India and Charlie's relationship, implicitly.

Charlie and India piano duet

This film is dark and puzzling. Creepy but sublime. Just to see Charlie's eyes has given me goosebumps. They look scary and intimidating but preposterously beautiful. Also India's house and outfits seems vintage, you won't realize this film sets in modern day. The horrific classic music and the fairly fast plot.. also roots Stoker's cold atmosphere. Three main actors, Wasikowska, Goode and Kidman performances are well done nicely too. Such great approach by Chan-wook Park, the director, who is also the director of Oldboy (2003). (A korean film, same psychological theme just like Stoker, but a lot more puzzling and the most mindfuck film ever seen. You should watch it too.)

I recommend Stoker if you want a mindblowing puzzled film with a twist ending.
Final verdict: 8/10