The fourth movie of The Conjuring franchise known as The Nun hit the theaters last weekend. It brought in a staggering 53.5 million opening weekend, which is a record for The Conjuring series.

The film stars sensational actors like Taissa Farmiga (best known for her roles in the FX series American Horror Story), Charlotte Hope, Bonnie Aarons and Demián Bichir. The running time is one hour and 36 minutes.

The beginning is rather confusing if you haven’t seen any of the previous Conjuring movies. It shows flashbacks to previous movies featuring the evil nun spirit.

We are then brought to a scene of two nuns in the depths of the abbey being rather horrified by the spirit.

It starts out pretty gory from the start. Before you even get a title sequence you get the image of a nun who has hanged herself. If gore is not your thing or puts you off, this is probably not a movie you’d be interested in seeing.

Once we’re past the backstory (which ultimately is pretty helpful for new fans of the series), we obtain a high range of exposition when it comes to the three main characters: Sister Irene, Father Burke, and Frenchie. This proves quite valuable, as the audience becomes much more invested in the story that way, and the movie is not built solely on jumpscares.

There are definitely a few jumpscares, but you don’t really think about them too much because you really do become absorbed in the plot. This also causes the jumpscares have a bit more shock value. You don’t really expect them to come because that’s not what you’re focused on.

The set location was absolutely beautiful. The producers actually filmed in Romania, the same place where the story is based. All of the scenes outside were incredible to look at. Such as the scenes where the three characters are outside the abbey, which was really the Corvin Castle.

The cinematography was also fantastic. It did a great job of getting every bit of the set in the shot, and it was very pleasing to look at. All of the camera work in the movie was one of the best qualities of the film.

There were also many great visual examples of biblical symbolism and imagery, which tied into the movie perfectly and added that much more to it.

One of the only things that was a bit off was the writing. Don’t get me wrong, it finished the job, but it was all over the place.

One moment we were with the nuns in the abbey, the next minute father Burke was having a deep conversation with sister Irene, and then all of a sudden father Burke is almost getting killed by the evil spirits.

This was more annoying than anything and made it unnecessarily more difficult to follow the movie.

SPOILER AHEAD

The other thing that was weird was the resolution. All of the nuns but sister Irene dies, and they are all buried on the abbey grounds, despite the land being claimed as unholy.

At the end of the movie it shows a class in the 70s (the film is based in the mid 50s) studying demonic possession, and it shows Frenchie being possessed, along with a distressed sister Irene.

Then it just ends.

It’s likely the writers wanted to keep it open for another movie, but it was once again rather annoying.

SPOILER OVER

If you enjoy horror movies, or want to try one out, I highly recommend The Nun. It’s ultimately a great movie that was put together beautifully.

Unlike Annabelle, The Nun is based on a myth rather than a true story. When it comes to scariness, it helps knowing nothing about it was true.

If you don’t like horror, The Nun is definitely an okay movie to skip. However, even if you have the slightest interest, it’s a marvelous  movie to see.