Annabelle Comes Home is a 2019 horror film that has the Annabelle doll summon evil spirits to a new group of people.
Let’s start this review by saying we’ve been getting way too many boring and unnecessary installments set in The Conjuring universe. At this point, seeing the series try so desperately hard to become a franchise is overkill. After we have just recently had the uninspired and messy flick The Curse of La Llorona, Annabelle Comes Home is now the 7th film in this cinematic universe. Written and directed by Gary Dauberman, the co-writer of the previous Conjuring spin-offs, sadly he adds nothing new to the iconic and creepy doll known as Annabelle. It honestly feels like these directors, except James Wan and David F. Sandberg, just don’t care about bringing something fresh and creative to the horror style of filmmaking, and instead they make clichéd and stupid films that will eventually give us horror movie fatigue.
It takes place after the events of the first Annabelle in a very convoluted timeline filled with useless installments that no one has asked for. The funny thing is that Annabelle Comes Home doesn’t even have a story! It’s just scene after scene with no proper narrative, which ultimately feels like there is no tension for the audience to be invested in. But the basic premise is that after Ed and Lorraine Warren (Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga) have retrieved Annabelle and locked it in their possessed artifacts room, their daughter Judy (Mckenna Grace) and her two babysitters (Madison Iseman and Katie Sarife) are trapped in the Warrens’ house by the doll who has unleashed evil spirits on them. It’s a clichéd and forgettable formula that people have seen so many times before in previous horror flicks. You can tell just by briefly summarizing this film that it’s not going to be interesting whatsoever…
Once again, Dauberman’s screenplay is very weak as he provides nothing intriguing to the movie, and the characters are dull and underdeveloped. Judy is the only person you care about as the actress really tries her best to bring some likeability to her performance. However, Sarife’s character Daniela makes a lot of unbearably stupid decisions throughout, and you eventually stop rooting for her as the film goes on. While she’s written to be such a clichéd role, it doesn’t change the fact that she’s one of the main reasons it’s hard to sit through this movie. Horror clichés are heavily utilized from start to finish, and it’s an aspect that takes away all the enjoyment and suspense from Annabelle Comes Home. Also, there are so many scenes that can be easily cut! The pacing is painfully sluggish during the first half, because nothing happens. Then the second half continues to drag on with weak, lazy and repetitive scares, which makes you realize that all the scenes with the terrifying Annabelle are very bland.
Annabelle Comes Home is yet again another uninspired attempt in trying to bring something new and frightening to this franchise. After seeing so many Conjuring spin-offs, it has now become clear that these films are nothing but shameless and boring cash-grabs. As a movie that has dull characters and no story whatsoever, you immediately start to check out. The horror genre is back to being stupid rather than showcasing some actual passion and fulfillment from filmmakers.