Annabelle: Creation — Not too scary a creation

Cast: Stephanie Sigman, Talitha Bateman, Anthony LaPaglia, Miranda Otto

Rated: 5/10

Well, dolls will be dolls — scaring the hell out of you in forlorn, dingy mansions constructed by horror Hollywood. However, this recreation of that wide-eyed, chubby cheek, red lipstick doll with killer instincts (she is the first and only one from a limited edition toy line) is not so scary, slow on the uptake and rather stretched on the imagination front.

But in between it does have those scary, screechy moments that come with those errant Hollywood dolls, cherubic children, a lost daughter, parents who want her around even if she returns as a not so friendly spirit and a mansion in the middle of nowhere adding to the isolation and silence that are essentials to deck up any strain of haunted drama.

In this one, Annabelle remains locked behind a Bible-pasted closet as the couple of the house live 12 long years in the fear of unleashing its evil intent. But once the couple invites some orphanage girls and their caretaker nun to come and live with them, everything goes for a six and it is only then that this movie takes its first step into the horror genre.

In that sense, it takes too much precious time to build up the haunted house story and once the drama begins, it exploits the waiting to happen, lingering camera technique to build up the screams in you.

A far scream from The Conjuring in which this doll first spun terror, this Annabelle creation rears its evil intentions in the 1940s and lives for 24 years to make capture a soul (of one of the missing orphan girls) and enter another family in another place and in another timeframe.

That much for predictability of a demon doll that refuses to be laid to rest, feeding on a series of ageing series that is slowing going into a not-so-chilling franchise.

Source: Sunday Pioneer, 20 August, 2017