La Llorona Collection

Horror

The Curse of La Llorona

Atomic Monster

New Line Cinema

Emile Gladstone Productions

United States of America

English

Español

Linda Cardellini

Raymond Cruz

Patricia Velásquez

Roman Christou

Jaynee-Lynne Kinchen

Marisol Ramirez

Sean Patrick Thomas

Tony Amendola

Oliver Alexander

Aiden Lewandowski

Irene Keng

DeLaRosa Rivera

Madeleine McGraw

Sophia Santi

Jethan Camarena

Fontana Sim

Scarlett Black

Don Roberson

Sierra Hawkins

Paul Rodríguez

John Marshall Jones

Ricardo Mamood-Vega

Andrew Tinpo Lee

Jeffrey Wetzel

Richard Brener

Kurt Bryant

Kelli Barksdale

Amanda Hall

Philip Waley

Noelle Therese Mulligan

Carrie Morrow

Linda Kessler

Marc Newland

Alice Rietveld

Jesse Garcia

Tina Peterson

Alyssa Hill

Steven Cueva

Julie Pearce

Monavie Tutop

Tim Dodge

Rich Heichel

Walter Volpatto

Dave McMoyler

Brian Magrum

Coleen 'Co-Co' Aiello

Alain J. Romi

Michelle Pazer

Joe Barnett

Tim McKeown

Bob Lacivita

Michael Owen

Joel Tokarsky

Belinda McCormick

Oliver Mancebo

Tim Song Jones

Scott Martin Gershin

Pat O'Mara

Annie Brandt

Craig Bauer

James Ferrera

Dana Niu

Olivia Summers

Pamela Winn-Barnett

Adam Jenkins

Traci E. Smithe

Drew Rebelein

Angelique Perez

Andrew Bock

Judah Getz

Renetta G. Amador

Nathan Dean Fetzer

Peter Weidenfeller

Pj Aguilera

Masanobu 'Tomi' Tomita

Stacee Hammond

Kevin Caira

Michael Burgess

Mike Horton

Pamela Scott-Farr

Ator Tamras

Walter Spencer

Gage Hubbard

Juliana Potter

Jozo Zovko

Lorena Talpan

Nicholas Kaat

Sean Burris

Eleanor Sabaduquia

Michael D. Wilhoit

Jamie Hardt

Aaron A. Goffman

Mikki Daughtry

Michael Chaves

Tobias Iaconis

James Wan

Joseph Bishara

Phil DeSanti

Peter Gvozdas

Megan Spatz

Melanie Jones

Rich Delia

Gary Dauberman

Michelle Morrissey

Michael Clear

Emile Gladstone

Victoria Palmeri

Walter Hamada

Judson Scott

Dave Neustadter

Manuel São Bento

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It’s not as bad as The Nun, let me write this straight away. If there’s one thing that this movie proves is Michael Chavestalented filmmaking skills, which offers hope for The Conjuring 3. Contrary to the other spin-off of the universe, The Curse of La Llorona toned down on the lazy exposition and elevated its scary sequences, simply by having a more capable director. Beautiful one-take scenes are spread throughout the runtime, which not only increase the suspense but prove that Chaves actually works hard to provide a terrifying environment.

He also delivers some effective and innovative jump scares, even though most of them still follow an annoyingly predictable timing. These are still heavy on the cliche of “character turning her head, big ugly monster face screams and the score goes from silence to screeching volume.” Scenes like these aren’t scary anymore and they feel dated, as well as the typical origin story. There’s nothing new or exciting in an “urban legend turned true.” Fortunately, the backstory is simple, it isn’t filled with explicit exposition every two minutes, and the short runtime helps the film to develop through a fast pacing. Sadly, it’s just another common horror screenplay that the writers took from the scripts cabinet.

Linda Cardellini gives a strong performance as the protagonist. Even though every character in this movie makes questionable decisions that lead to avoidable events (something inevitable in horror films), Anna is a compelling and courageous woman, who only wants to do what’s best for any children, not only their own. Raymond Cruz portrays Rafael, a priest who sort of almost is a deus ex machina. He barely has any kind of decent character development, but he works well enough as comic relief to lighten up an otherwise too dark tone. The kids are good, but Patricia Velasquez (Patricia Alvarez) is way over-the-top, which doesn’t help her already not-so-good script.

All in all, The Curse of La Llorona is … okay. It’s not near as horrible as The Nun, and honestly, that’s a good compliment for such a typical and cliche horror flick. Michael Chaves truly saves what could have been a disaster with another director. Wonderfully handled one-take sequences, which elevate the suspense levels, and he also produced some imaginative jump scares, even if most of them still lack actual scariness. Linda Cardellini is great as the lead, but every character is compelled to make dumb decisions to move the plot forward. Some characters needed more care in their scripts, and more focus on the story to tell instead of just creating scares after scares.

Close, but not close enough …

Rating: C+

Gimly

Where I'm from, this was marketed as _The Curse of the Weeping Woman_ 'cause I guess Australia can't be trusted with to pronounce a Spanish word. Similarly, I guess Warner Bros. can't be trusted to make a horror movie without cramming it into the bloated _Conjuring_ franchise.

I love seeing Linda Cardellini get work, but I don't know that a La Llorona movie was the best choice to put her in lead of, and I do know that **this** La Llorona movie was a bad choice, just like... Generally speaking. "Bad" might be too far. Bland? Old hat? Something along those lines might be a label that fits a little better. Definitely not the label "good" though.

_Final rating:★★ - Had some things that appeal to me, but a poor finished product._

Acting was fine but the rest was one big cliche of the supernatural-horror genre with too many jump scares and the evil entity pretty much reminded me of the Nun, which makes sense since this is set in the Conjuring Universe.

'The Curse of La Llorona' entertained me! First and foremost, the La Llorona demon is exactly what I wanted 'The Nun' to be - creepy without words, a perfect mix. The filmmakers utilise the character nicely, as well as importantly setting the right tone.

Not to quote Gloria Stuart, but it feels like forever since I've enjoyed a movie from this franchise - and this isn't even an 'official' part of 'The Conjuring' universe (which probably explains why it's actually good - harsh, yet true). That's not to say it's amazingly made, e.g. there is some iffy writing; that part near the end with the doll is rather dumb, if ignorable.

Linda Cardellini brings a very good performance, while Raymond Cruz is a neat piece of casting. Roman Christou and Jaynee-Lynne Kinchen make for solid kid actors, too. Tony Amendola appears as Father Perez, but remember it's absolutely not a part of the franchise...

The bad reception that this has got is a shame, not that it changes the way I see it. A perfect example of why it's good to form your own opinions with film, because apparently 'The Conjuring 2' is good but this is bad - the opposite is true for me. Me and this franchise don't click correctly, evidently.

I love that this is part of the Conjuring Universe, as this is a common folk tale told in Latin American households. I know we used it to test how brave other kids were, as there were horrible stories of people seeing her face and getting scratched in the bathrooms. 
I really enjoyed this telling of the story as it was terrifying and had scary jump moments to it. 
Great cast, great facial expressions they were able to carry throughout the film

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The Curse of La Llorona

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Cast

Linda Cardellini

Raymond Cruz

Patricia Velásquez

Roman Christou

Jaynee-Lynne Kinchen

Marisol Ramirez

Sean Patrick Thomas

Tony Amendola

Oliver Alexander

Aiden Lewandowski

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