When it comes to horror movies, there are few films that have been as hyped up as the new movie from Neon Films featuring the beautiful Sydney Sweeney. This film which I will be calling The Convent Horror, advertised a mixture of religious and psychological horror with the action taking place in an Italian countryside convent. It was directed by Michael Mohan and written by Andrew Lobel; the movie was premiered at South by Southwest and gained attention due to the plot and Sweeney’s participation. As I started watching the movie and it starts to develop I was left somewhat confused and uncertain of how exactly I felt, I wanted this movie to be as good as The First Omen (2024), since I saw it first but Immaculate was not there. While The Convent Horror has some merits it also has some demerits which gives a feeling that there was a lot that could have been done. There were some positive and negative aspects of the movie, its mood, acting and the overall work done that determines the film’s position in the horror sub genre.
- IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt23137390/
- Platform: Amazon
- Release: March 12, 2024
The Atmosphere and Setting
From the very beginning of the movie, the elements of horror and confinement are properly describe in the movie, The Convent Horror as the audience is flown over the green pastures of the Italian countryside and then dumped in the compound of a convent. The film’s cinematography by Elisha Christian and the production design by Adam Reamer are worthy of special mention as they have effectively painted a rather spooky picture on the screen. The convent with its shadows and the noises of the old wooden doors and floors becomes an actor that contributes to the creation of the film’s atmosphere. The music also plays a crucial role in creating the atmosphere of the film as the music is quite good as creating a suspense atmosphere and rather different from the conventional horror movie soundtracks.Sydney Sweeney's Performance
Sydney Sweeney an actress featured in the TV shows Euphoria and The White Lotus, plays the role of Cecilia, an American nun who gets herself into a horrifying situation. Sweeney is another character that was well portrayed in the film and this is another strength of the film. In the role of Cecilia, a naive and ignorant of the world she is living in, she demonstrates both vulnerability and purpose to the story that make the audience interested, its very clear she is the victim, question at hand is who is the monster. Sweeney also shows fear, confusion, and determination well, especially in the last part of the film when her character experiences a lot of changes. It is quite evident that she is a versatile actress and her role in the film enhances the reality factor of the movie.
The Script and Storytelling
Here comes some of the downside, the film’s major drawback is the script, the opening of the story is with Cecilia and her past is only briefly mentioned. We are told about a tragic event that happened in the past and a radical change of the character’s spiritual state, but these and other important aspects are not described in detail leaving too many questions with events that start happening without much validation or base. The story takes place when Cecilia enters the convent and soon finds out that the world is not black and white as she thought, things are very different in every single aspect. The convent’s dark past and the masked men in red are interesting, but the movie does not explore these aspects further, the script is more focused on the moments that can trigger a reaction rather than the characters and their background or the story’s plot.
Interesting Insights
The Convent Horror is one of the movies that tries to combine elements of religious horror with the psychological ones, kind of the new trend on 2024 that I'm really enjoy despite Immaculate been not the most successful attempt at it. Some of the major themes that are describe in the film include faith, control and autonomy especially concerning Cecilia’s character. The film also explores the relationships of the power within the convent especially between the main villain Father Sal Tedeschi (Alvaro Morte) and the Mother Superior (Dora Romano), these themes might be interesting but they are not fully developed and the audience is left with many questions and not much understanding, from all the previous failed experiments, the nun who fights Cecilia because she is not the chosen one, there are many factors left behind that are cliff hangers during the entire movie.Online Audience Perception
The view of the online audience regarding The Convent Horror has been moderate with some of the audience enjoy the film’s suspense and Sweeney’s acting while others having a different perspective because the movie feels superficial and full of horror cliches. The reviews on the Rotten Tomatoes and IMDb sites focus on the aspects that make the film good at generating tension and providing an interesting visual experience but many expressed that the movie has a poor script and two dimensional characters as its major flaws, its just too simple, too easy to predict. The climax of the movie towards the end on how savage Cecilia turns might be the most interesting part that probably left the audience thinking how was she capable of doing such horror action but also concluding that she was used as an object against her will putting a "monster" inside of her.
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