The Nun
Corin Hardy
Initial release: September 7, 2018 (USA)
Sometimes when talking about gothic horror, academics (and lit types in general) tend to forget that the genre isn't some high-minded reflection of the anxieties of the 19th (and early 20th) centuries, written in airless spaces by quiet geniuses speaking truth to power. No, gothic horror, as the first "real" horror genre, is by and large schlock for a breathless upper-class audience to scare themselves silly with in between bouts of smoking opium and discussing how they could profit from the Crimean War. That trend has continued into the modern day with film and even video games picking up what the books started. Some of the schlockiest movies I've ever seen have been gothic horror, like The Woman in Black remake and especially its sequel. Sure, you get the occasional smart one, like The Others, but by and large, if you're looking for "elevated" horror, maybe a spinoff of The Conjuring, the cult favorite Catholic horror franchise, isn't the place to look. I really liked The Nun, though.
The year is 1952, and a nun in rural Romania has committed suicide under mysterious circumstances. The Vatican, suspecting something awry, sends one of their exorcism specialists, Father Burke, to investigate, accompanied by a young novice, Sister Irene (played by Taissa Farmiga, whose older sister Vera is in the main Conjuring films.) Along the way they meet Frenchie, a French-Canadian world traveler who's been living in the area for a bit and who discovered the body. Right away it becomes clear that something is very, very awry at the old castle, and that it has something to do with a shape-shifting demon (who may be familiar to fans of the second Conjuring film — I personally haven't seen it) sealed away in the basement of the castle for hundreds of years. Bombing from World War II broke the seal, and it's taken everything the nuns living at the castle could do to keep it contained.
Honestly, if you're no fan of jumpscares, give this one a miss. The demon stalks the halls at night in the form of a nun; like any good haunting worth its salt it has a strong taste for theatrics, constantly playing mindgames and illusions on the characters, complete with a moment of build-up and then BOO. In a lot of ways The Nun feels like a throwback, good and bad; the pacing and subtle humor feels very 1990s, but the jumpscares absolutely scream mid to late-2000s. This isn't a bad thing by any means, not least because I am ancient and I like stuff to seem like it's from my era. But it's definitely not part of the rareified air of the modern era of "elevated" horror and isn't trying to be: it's just good old-fashioned Catholic horror.
That's no joke, by the way. The Conjuring franchise is notorious for leaning on Catholic messaging and beliefs, largely in service of sanitizing the reputations of Ed and Lorraine Warren, a pair of self-described paranormal investigators. Throughout the 1970s and 80s the Warrens participated in a series of paranormal investigations and exorcisms, including the notorious Amityville house, supposedly the site of an intense demonic presence following the mass murder of the entire family that lived there by the eldest son. (That's right, that makes the Amityville Horror movies part of the Conjuringverse. Sort of.) The Warrens were essentially grifters, preying on the fears of gullible and desperate people looking for answers to perfectly ordinary problems while emphasizing a pseudo-scientific approach to demonology and hauntings. All those ghost hunter shows that were popular a decade or so ago can thank the Warrens for their methodology.
The Nun isn't possessed of such lofty ulterior motives, though. Based as it is on one of the demons that appeared in The Conjuring 2, it's wholly a spinoff and largely exists to have some good old-fashioned gothic fun. The three main characters are all entertaining and different from each other, the script making good use of their respective strengths to keep the film together despite the bumper crop of jump scares threatening to tear it apart. The film is arguably at its weakest when the characters are separated, though Sister Irene and the castle's nuns make for some really great scenes.
The Nun isn't a perfect film. Sometimes plot threads don't really go anywhere; the aforementioned jumpscares may disappoint, especially since The Conjuring apparently didn't rely on them nearly as much. But I liked it; it'd been a while since I'd seen a good Gothic chiller and The Nun certainly delivered on that front. It's a little old fashioned, a little sacrilegious, just like a good Gothic horror should be.
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