![]() ![]() ![]() You can tell The Unholy is revolving around this idea of truth and lies, our main character is on the outs because he lied about a story, the church wants to get people to lie to protect their image, the villainous Mary is lying about who she is. Speaking of not good, the story was a mess of a thing. Even people who should be better like Cary Elwes just didn’t seem to try, especially with whatever accent he was going for (was he trying to do a Boston accent?) it was just not good. Maybe the person playing Alice was coming close to trying but only because she had to project her voice to sound like a preacher and raising your voice gives the implication of emotion… no one else had that. Not that happiness is a feeling one can have during The Unholy, mostly I just experienced boredom and judging by how phoned in all the performances were, I probably wasn’t the only one. At least I hope this was a rush job because if someone looked at some of these shots with their bad compositing and awful CGI and said “Yeah that’s acceptable” I’m not going to be happy. It’s just bad in a way that tells me someone was being rushed and didn’t have time to work on the shot. Every time she’s on screen it just looks bad, and not even standout bad. That pathetic CGi might be at its worst any time that we see Mary because we’re meant to be scared of her but I’m just sitting here laughing my ass off at how she moves. Things like fire, smoke, dust and blood are all so clearly CGI that it’s pathetic. The CGI used in this movie is practically trying to pull you out of the reality of it, and it’s all for stuff that could’ve been done so much better with practical work. The scares are non-existent, failing to either be surprising enough to count as a jump scare (because you can see them coming a mile away) or look good enough to be believable. Nothing about this film works on any level. The Unholy sucks and I’m not even going to try and pretend it doesn’t completely suck. Blah blah, queue obligatory jump scares and loud noises, this sucks. Once there he learns that the story he came to report on was a hoax, but a more interesting one has started to form as a deaf-mute girl named Alice (Cricket Brown) has seemingly been healed by a spirit known as Mary and has begun a small congregation of people who she heals… unfortunately, Mary is not the Virgin Mary as everyone might assume but Mary Elnor, a witch who was burned at the stake and is now back for her vengeance. The Unholy follows journalist Gerry Fenn (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) who, after a scandal where he allegedly made up stories, has been put on jobs that no one else wants which leads to him taking a story about cow mutilation in Banfield Massachusetts. Sometimes there can be exceptions, the first Conjuring movie is a prime example of a film in this genre that understands how to put tension and real stakes in to make it work… we don’t have a film like that today, we have The Unholy and I hate it. Things like Paranormal Activity or Annabelle where there’s a haunting and the film is usually nothing but a set of jumpscares surrounded by mediocre characters who don’t run for their lives when that’s the safe and sensible option. Finally, there are some visuals in this film (early and in the very end) that make absolutely zero sense and almost like they were purposely there for a trailer.Of all the horror genres there are, the is one that I’ve never been exactly fond of and that’s the paranormal horror. If you are a film fan I would definitely skip it. If you are a horror fan aching for some new horror - I would skip. In fact, without any reshoots and just some simple editing choices, I feel this movie could've been a lot better (and even saved some money on some horrid CGI). The real shame is that the film does seem like it could be saved. Both messages feel unearned and almost slapped together. In the end, you are left with two messages: one about truth and one about faith. Despite how fast-paced the movie seems, it still feels like it's dragging on at times. A lot of the rules established in the film are broken even minutes after being created. The writing holds the viewer's hand in an already simple plot. The horror film is centered exclusively around jump scares and with that exception has zero horror. The writing holds the viewer's hand The Unholy is an awkward film that ultimately tries to leave the viewer with a positive message but not even a positive message can make this a good film. The Unholy is an awkward film that ultimately tries to leave the viewer with a positive message but not even a positive message can make this a good film. ![]()
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