In “Ouija: Origin Of Evil,” newly promoted director Mike Flanagan (who helmed the brilliant Netflix darling, “Hush”) sticks to his roots as a horror mistero with the flare for bulky character arcs and development. Taking place a solid 40+ years before the events in the atrocious predecessor “Ouija”, “Evil” picks up the pieces with a fortune teller named Alice (Elizabeth Reaser) and her two children Doris (Lulu Wilson) and Lina (Annalise Basso) as they make a living out of hoaxing emotionally desperate patrons. They use trickery and stylized gadgets to perform illusions as if they were speaking with the dead. Long and behold that doesn’t stop the mother from purchasing a new game on the block Ouija, that allows the option for normal folks to communicate with the other side. Only thing is, the game starts encompassing a mind of it’s own, before relinquishing hell, and using young Doris as a conduit for mass paranoia and destruction. But at least we actually care about what happens to this characters, unlike the original “Ouija” which just used actors as bait for it’s own gain. It’s as though Flanagan took notes from the first one, tried to make his own movie and distanced himself from the original as much as possible. His characters have meaning, they make smart decisions, and, they are acted well by a group of mostly unknown actors. Specifically Lulu Wilson as young Doris who delivers a speech about strangulation with such ease and concentration, it made me cringe. Audience might leave fatigued by the film’s cop-out ending, but everything which precludes that seems to have it’s mind in the right place. B
EntertainmentOct 31, 2016
Odyssey Film Review: OUIJA: ORIGIN OF EVIL
The real salvation here lies in director Mike Flanagan who has an eye for horror like no other director working today.
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