Director: Mike Flanagan
Notable Cast: Annalise Basso, Ellizabeth Reaser, Lulu
Wilson, Henry Thomas, Parker Mack, Doug Jones, Kate Siegel, Sam Anderson, Lin
Shaye
I disliked the original Ouija
enough that I refused to even write a review for it. It was critically panned
across the board (I made a funny!), but that didn’t stop the film from
garnering some serious box office cash and getting a sequel green lit.
Normally, I wouldn’t have given this sequel the time of day based on my opinion
of the first one, but when Mike Flanagan’s name was attached to it the film
leaped to the top of my list to see. Flanagan is one of the iconic directorial
voices in modern horror, thanks to films like Absentia and Oculus, and
his inclusion in this sequel made it one of the big question marks for the
year. Strike that question mark out of the equation though because Ouija: Origin of Evil is not only
superior to its predecessor, but it’s one of the more stylish horror films of
the year. It’s a film that embraces its limited, mainstream structures and
delivers enough Halloween scares to pull in audiences this October with
pizzazz.