The Nun 2

 

 This review may contain spoilers! 

The Nun II is a sequel to the 2018 film, The Nun, and serves as the eighth film in the Conjuring universe (ninth if you count La Llorona). Set in 1956 we follow Sister Irene once again as she ventures across Europe to stop Belial from obtaining a holy relic via the mortal it has possessed. I had a sense this film was going to be better from the first almost immediately, the opening scene that shows Belial slowly working towards killing a priest in a church is spine-chilling. Suddenly Valak is a shade once more, something the camera shows in small moments, just in the shadows or slightly obscured but never hidden. Michael Chaves did some great work on The Curse of La Llorona back in the day for similar reasons and a lot of that skill around knowing when to highlight the monstrous is all present here. The girls boarding school that is our main setting for the feature is a fine choice of environment, we feel this greater sense of dread with there being a large number of children at risk and the addition of the lone man on staff being the threatening force. The way Valak begins to dominate and gain more and more of a foothold over the school while their adversaries are moving too slowly against them is chilling. The scares in the first two acts are genuinely very well orchestrated and unflinchingly land. The audience I was in was verbally shrieking themselves at various points.

The way this feature is shot shows a real understanding of good horror, the balance of colour and lighting in multiple scenes in absolutely commendable. I also liked the variety in those scenes where you knew a scare was coming because the approach felt very different with every new scene. The editing helped construct a decent sense of pace and the special effects were far creepier than the first Nun. I also loved the eerie classic score on offer, it grounded us in the historical setting but it also really gripped you with this deep sense of foreboding.

 

Taissa Farmiga, who played Irene, really finds her feet as a leading protagonist this time around; I found the way Farmiga portrays a role so entirely riddled with fear after her last confrontation with valak was a compelling new character trait. Anna Popplewell, who played Kate, feels like a strong point of motherly guidance and protection for her on-screen daughter (Downey); I also think Popplewell and Bloquet share some phenomenal romantic on-screen chemistry that tells a story without many scenes or dialogue. Katelyn Rose Downey, who played Sophie, really is the heart of the feature; Downey presents a young girl who sees a lot of good in others and is unwaveringly kind in the face of a lot of darkness.

However, the best performance came from Jonas Bloquet, who played Maurice. This was a performance that really surprised me as Bloquet's character in The Nun really seemed to just feel quite secondary to what Bichir and Farmiga were doing. But the sequel would never work without this fantastic display. Bloquet enters most of his scenes with a winning charisma that makes you warm to him immediately. He shares his time onscreen really gracefully and you feel genuine connection between himself and those he performs across from. I loved how empathetic he was in this, the grief he feels over the harm he is doing others really is such a distinct but powerful point of performance. I also found that Bloquet really understood how to play the monster well, it can be hard for an actor with minimal special effects make-up to be so scary but he managed to draw a few jumps from me. This might not have been a role I liked the first time around but Bloquet has converted me entirely this time around.

As much as I really can praise the massive return to horror on display here I also think there are some lingering issues that the Conjuring universe and these Nun movies just aren't shaking. Sister Irene is a far more compelling protagonist this time around but it is a shame she is saddled with a paranormal investigation plot for almost the whole film that feels like the B plot because it is the least interesting part. This film has two major storylines operating in tandem and they don't always cross streams very well; ultimately culminating in a manner that is very abrupt for the viewer. I also found The Nun II to be the sort of film that really loses itself in the final act. Seeing Valak suddenly become a big special effects display was disappointing and undercut the quiet pervasive sinister presence we had earlier. The whole thing felt more like a messy battle or conflict between our heroes and the demon rather than an ending to a horror movie. I also thought Sister Irene using the power of prayer and a few barrels of wine to defeat a truly terrifying demon was a seriously underwhelming way to end the film. No one in the audience was there for the heavy church exposition and reveal of Irene as some kind of Christian demigod nun, something that actually felt instep with the rest of the feature would have served the piece better.

Storm Reid, who played Debra, really just doesn't seem to belong in this feature at all; Reid really struggles to portray a role that feels convincingly from the 1950s. Léontine d'Oncieu and Anouk Darwin Homewood, who played Simone and Celeste respectively, felt exceptionally generic as the young bully roles of the film; the fact the film wound up just shunting these two into screaming roles that ran around a lot in the ending spoke to how little they had to give to the feature.

While this might not be the best horror film of 2023, it is certainly the best the Conjuring universe has been in a long time. I would give The Nun 2 a 6/10.