THE CONJURING: THE DEVIL MADE ME DO IT (2021) Review

“The court accepts the existence of God every time a witness swears to tell the truth,” Patrick Wilson’s Ed Warren says at one point in The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It, a line featured in many of the film’s marketing materials. He continues, “I think it’s about time they accept the existence of the devil.” It’s a strong marketing hook for the big screen return of the endlessly endearing paranormal superheroes, with the general premise for the third mainline Conjuring film — the eighth overall in the expanded Conjuring Universe, however — allowing Ed and Lorraine Warren to do something a little bit different this time around. Rather than banishing spooky spirits inside a creepy house, Ed and Lorraine hit the road, setting out to prove that a recent murder was the result of demonic possession.

Set in 1981, a new setting for a franchise that has previously only played around in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It begins where most possession-based horror movies would end: with a wild exorcism. At the exorcism of a young boy named David Glatzel, Ed and Lorraine Warren witness the demonic spirit jump into the body of Arne Johnson, whose real life story the movie is based on. Johnson subsequently killed a man and became the first person in America to claim demonic possession as a defense for a murder, and the movie centers on Ed and Lorraine’s quest to track down the demon responsible.

Not all Conjuring movies are created equal, and two main things have separated the mainline movies from the various spinoffs over the years. For starters, The Conjuring and The Conjuring 2 were both directed by franchise architect James Wan, and both movies centered on Patrick Wilson’s Ed Warren and Vera Farmiga’s Lorraine Warren. These two factors have lent a “prestige” quality to the core movies in the franchise, and the good news here is that Wilson and Farmiga are very much back and as charming as ever in The Devil Made Me Do It. On the flipside, however, this is the first non-spinoff Conjuring movie that wasn’t directed by James Wan himself, with Michael Chaves (The Curse of La Llorona) taking over the reins.

With this one, well, we have to take the good with the not-so-good.

You’d be hard pressed to find two more likable horror heroes than Wilson and Farmiga, whose loving relationship continues to be the very heart and soul of the Conjuring franchise. The individual charms they exude and palpable chemistry they share makes for an endless well that these movies can always tap into, and The Devil Made Me Do It isn’t afraid to tap that well for all it’s worth. The romance between Ed and Lorraine is front and center in The Conjuring 3, complete with flashbacks this time around that help to build out the history of their relationship. Sure, we’ve mostly seen all the lovey-dovey stuff before, but Wilson and Farmiga are so good together that those moments continue to provoke an emotional response that ensures these movies aren’t just horror stories but love stories as well. And with Ed not exactly 100% for much of this one, Farmiga gets a nice solo spotlight here, carrying the investigation on her back and showing off her abilities in fun new ways.

While The Devil Made Me Do It unquestionably shines when it’s focused on being a love story between two of the best characters Hollywood horror has given us in recent years, the film unfortunately stumbles when it comes time to deliver the horror that James Wan has become so adept at bringing to the table. The elegant, well-crafted sequences of terror that Wan masterfully peppered into The Conjuring and The Conjuring 2 are largely absent from the series’s third installment, replaced with far more generic horror movie scares that quite honestly don’t ever feel like they’re doing much justice to the Conjuring brand. Particularly in that scare-crafting department, Wan’s absence is very much felt here, with various set-pieces being so underutilized that they fail to bring the fear or make any lasting impression.

And it’s not just the scares that underwhelm, but the storytelling as well. While The Devil Made Me Do It seems primed and ready to deliver a whole new kind of Conjuring movie, it’s mostly comfortable going through the same motions we’ve already seen before. True, this time around we’re dealing with a man on trial for demonically-possessed murder, but there’s no actual trial to speak of here and no mystery behind the whole thing either. We already know what’s what right out of the gate, and the only question that’s really left to be answered is in regards to the demon responsible for what’s going on. While James Wan effortlessly created new horror icons in the previous films, the villain in The Devil Made Me Do It is both uninteresting and underdeveloped, easily the series’s dullest adversary to date. And while it’s positioned as the most sinister opponent the Warrens have ever faced, that’s never actually felt beyond some violent bits that do admittedly go harder than expected.

All around the script for The Devil Made Me Do It fails to connect the dots necessary to bring any real depth or resonance to the various storylines, with Arne Johnson’s story sidelined in much the same way the main villain’s is. And it’s a bummer because there are clear parallels between all of the major players that the movie doesn’t ever seem to have much interest in exploring. Arne Johnson and his girlfriend feel like young versions of Ed and Lorraine, while even the villain’s backstory links to the Warrens in an interesting way. But the movie seems to constantly be missing those connections, resulting in a flat story that ultimately leaves you feeling like there’s just not much gas left in this franchise’s tank. By the time yet another object is added to the Warrens’ artifact room at the end of the movie, it’s hard not to feel like the entire thing was as perfunctory as the lesser spinoffs have been.

Even the 1980s setting in The Devil Made Me Do It barely registers as anything fresh or new, with one integral early scene putting a classic 80s tune to good use but the film otherwise ignoring the decade altogether. For the most part, it feels like this third installment is still set in either the 60s or 70s, which is a minor gripe but it nevertheless would’ve been fun to see Chaves and the team play just a little bit more with the franchise’s first foray into an iconic decade with such a well-defined aesthetic attached to it. Mind you, 80s nostalgia is overplayed at this point, to say the least, but a touch of it would’ve been welcome here.

For the most part, all the ground that’s covered in The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It was already covered more effectively in the previous two movies, begging the question of how much more can really be milked from the Warrens’ extensive case files. The little bits of flashback footage here suggest that the more interesting approach is perhaps an Ed and Lorraine prequel story down the road, though it’s hard to imagine the characters being played by anyone other than Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga. They continue to be as winning as ever in their fourth major appearance in the extended Conjuring Universe, but they can only do so much heavy lifting when everything surrounding them isn’t up to snuff. For the first time, the magic of what they bring to the table feels like it deserves a better movie.

And this one made me miss being in the palm of James Wan’s hand.