The Banishing

Platform: Shudder

Director: Christopher Smith

Release Year: 2020

Watch Date: May 26, 2021

My Rating: 5.3

WTAF did I just watch?!? It’s not often that I watch a movie and get to the end and have this reaction, but seriously, what in the Hades? I’m behind on my movie reviews, but I HAVE to react to this one while it is fresh. Let me set the scene.

It’s the 1930s. Hitler has come to power and the rumblings of the Second World War have begun. England is abuzz with talk of Fascism. Marianne and her daughter come to the Borley Rectory to be with Marianne’s husband Linus, who is a vicar. Almost immediately Marianne begins hearing voices and seeing things.

Enter Harry Price a psychic who is seen as a heretic and Bishop Malachi who is sketchy AF. It turns out that the super shady Malachi is in league with the Nazis, although I still don’t understand that plot point. Harry tries to tell Linus about the house, but he won’t listen. Betsy, the maid, eventually convinces Marianne to visit Harry (consequently on a day when Malachi’s goons have just beat him up). Harry tells Marianne about the house and gives her a book about the monks who used to live there.

The creepy monks would torture women. One pregnant woman had her baby taken out of her and then she was blinded and left to die. The woman and her baby remained buried in the basement of the Rectory. Marianne starts to go crazy, Linus becomes a jerk, and eventually Adelaide (the daughter) runs off with the ghost of the blinded tortured woman.

In the end Adelaide finds the bones of the tortured woman and her baby and Marianne, Linus, and Harry are able to put the bones to rest. The movie ends with Malachi’s goons digging up the bones and Malachi taking them to Nazi headquarters in Germany (wait, what??? why???) and saying “I knew the girl would find the bones” (or something like that).

While the story was horrible, slow, and confusing. The acting and the cinematography were wonderful….resulting in a higher rating than the script deserved.

I would not watch this movie again.

Photo Credit: imdb.com