La Proie du diable

A generic and forgettable mainstream exorcism flick that should have been straight to VOD. The trailer was nice and pretended to be something refreshing, but it's drowned in clichés and unimaginative horror scenes. The very idea of a nun who resolutely believes that performing exorcisms is her calling is quite passable. The actress is likeable and the school of exorcists is something we may not have seen before, but they could definitely have squeezed more out of the relatively appealing premise, instead they relied more on the stuff seen a hundred times over. Fortunately, the film is only 90 minutes long and goes by pretty quickly, and I liked that it wasn't about only one possessed person, there were more (the little girl managed to be creepy), but I still found it underwhelming. The atmosphere doesn't work at all, every potentially interesting scene is ended with the cheapest jump-scare (not a single one worked for me in the whole movie), the finale in the catacombs does have a nice setting, but that's about it. It's classically PG-13, so no violence, the plot doesn't draw you in much and you don't care much about the characters. Watching it, I felt like I was watching a regular movie. Had I seen it movie at home, I would go even lower with the rating maybe. For myself, I recommend going to see Smile without a second thought. 5/10. (28/10/2022)