Movie Review – Malignant – 2021 – Tense Horror Movie
Table of Contents
My Rating – 2.5 out of 5
Plot Summary – Malignant
Malignant is directed by James Wan – of The Conjuring, Insidious, and Saw fame is a let down of sorts. Where the others by him have some amount of relatability to them, this one feels a little unreal by the time you come to the end of this movie’s 111 minutes of runtime. At least, this does not claim any connection to real-life events, thus avoiding a bit more ridicule! The concept of the movie is not that outlandish, but the treatment of the same leaves a lot to be desired. Horror movie audiences are generally prepared for the scares, the brooding and sinister soundtrack, etc. but most of them should not defy logic and the audience will see through it.
Coming to the story, it starts off with a flashback to the ’90s, in some medical facility with a foreboding ambiance – a medical experiment is in progress and something goes horribly wrong! Cut to the present day, into the house of Madison (Annabelle Wallis), whose abusive husband Derek loses his temper and bashes Madison’s head against the wall. He screams at his pregnant wife for not being able to carry her pregnancies to term, implying that it’s her fault that her previous miscarriages happened. This has apparently happened many times before and Madison has not walked out of the marriage thinking that a baby will change all that.
But, alas! Only this time, Derek meets his match in the black wearing, long-haired devilish spirit!! Their house is ransacked and a lot of damage happens before a concerned neighbor calls in the cops. It is treated as a home invasion and the cops cannot make any headway into it. Meanwhile, there are a spate of murders that happen nearby (in and around Seattle), and Madison reports to the Police that she can see them in advance but cannot stop them from happening. The Police are skeptical and think that madison is inventing these stories to deflect suspicion away from her. They start treating her as a suspect in the murders.
The police officers – Kekoa Shaw (George Young) and Regina (Michole Briana White), who were till now disbelieving Madison’s claims of a supernatural being committing these murders ( an imaginary friend Gabriel) slowly turn around to believing her story once they are themselves exposed to this malevolent being. Madison’s sister Sydney (Maddie Hasson) also joins in, trying to delve into Madison’s past, in order to uncover the secrets that lie there, which will eventually lead to the truth in Madison’s tormented life. From here, the story jets to an extremely eventful climax!
Conclusion – Movie Review of Malignant
The promise in the movie in becoming a horrifying movie is not lived upto due to the numerous plotholes and a loose directorial touch. The scares are predictable, the cinematography rather ordinary – only the background score lends some credibility to the movie’s claims of being a horror movie. The acting is not bad, the CGI sequences not extraordinary, and the story gets incredible at times. When I started watching this, I did have higher expectations of James Wan, but unfortunately, this does not live up to it.
If horror movies are your go-to mode of relaxation, this can be classified as a one-time watch with no takeaways from the experience.
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