Ouija: Origin of Evil Summary & Review
One Sentence Review: A horrifyingly brilliant follow-up to a “good, not great” horror film.
Ouija: Origin of Evil is a prequel to Universal’s 2014 horror film Ouija, based on the Hasbro line of ouija boards. This one takes place almost 50 years before the events of the first film. Alice Zander (Elizabeth Reaser) and her two daughters, Lina (Annalise Basso) and Doris (Lulu Wilson) run a faux-séance business in their California home. When Alice buys a ouija board to increase business, Doris gets a hold of it and makes contact with a dangerous entity. What starts as a chance to ring in new clients soon becomes something more sinister. It’s up to Alice, Lina, and a local priest (Henry Thomas) to save Doris before the demon consumes them all.
I am one of the few people who actually liked the first Ouija film. While it wasn’t the most original horror film, it wasn’t a terrible movie. However, I do have to agree with the critics on one thing. Ouija: Origin of Evil is a vast improvement over its predecessor. Under the control of horror master Mike Flanagan (Oculus, Before I Wake), this movie is superior to the first film in every way. The story was better, the characters were fully developed, and the scares were masterfully done. This is one of the most terrifying films I’ve seen this year.
The one thing I loved most about this movie was the fact that it didn’t look or feel like the first movie, or like any other modern horror movie for that matter. The way they structured and edited it made it look almost exactly like a movie from the 1960’s. I felt like a welcome change from most horror movies nowadays. They even included little visuals that made certain shots look like they were on old-fashioned film reels.
This movie is like The Purge: Anarchy. It’s a second film that is everything the first movie should have been. Like I said, the first movie wasn’t terrible. It just didn’t fully realize the potential of its premise. However, you have to give them some slack. They were trying to make a movie based on a marketed ouija board. They didn’t exactly have much to work with. In the end, Ouija: Origin of Evil is a brilliantly made horror movie, and probably the best movie based on a board game that has ever been made.
