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Director Felipe Vargas makes his feature debut with the supernatural horror flick “Rosario” (now in theaters), which very much feels like any number of films we’ve seen before. Its elevator pitch is that it’s essentially Sam Raimi’s “Drag Me to Hell” by way of Chris Weitz’s “A Better Life.” What separates “Rosario” from its predecessors and makes it a singular experience is its embrace of Latin American culture.
Emeraude Toubia stars as our titular character, a successful Mexican-American New York City stockbroker who’s summoned to the apartment of her abuela Griselda (Constanza Gutierrez) when she’s discovered deceased by her super Marty (Paul Ben-Victor, late of “Nobody Wants This”).
Rosario hadn’t seen Griselda in quite some after the death of her mother Elena (Diana Lein). Prior to Elena’s passing she and Rosario’s father Oscar (José Zúñiga, best remembered by me as the Agent who made Cyrus the Virus sadder when he lost his bladder in the aaaiirrrplane in “Con Air”) divorced and their daughter sided with her Dad.
Weird things are afoot when Rosario arrives at Griselda’s apartment. She discovers a bunch of voodoo artifacts and abuela’s body becomes reanimated by a supernatural being. A curse befalls Rosario and she must now learn about and embrace her heritage to survive the night.
“Rosario” isn’t particularly scary, but it’s got plenty of gooey, grody body horror that’s achieved through the practical artistry of special effects supervisor Felipe De La Roche and special makeup effects artist Kc Mussman.
The story as scripted by Alan Trezza (he previously penned the Alexandra Daddario genre vehicles “Burying the Ex” and “We Summon the Darkness”) didn’t do a whole lot for me during much of the runtime, but it goes to a whole other (and better) level with a late-movie twist.
Toubia is a competent actress and is lovely to look at, but Trezza’s script often does her no favors. Let this lady dig deeper and play a greater variety of notes.
Awesome character actor David Dastmalchian turns up as Griselda’s eavesdropping neighbor Joe. The entire arc of his character is wanting the air fryer he lent abuela returned to him. Give this dude more to do!
Representation is important even in silly (but not entirely so) genre fare such as “Rosario.” While it’s only a so-so movie there will be an audience for this and Vargas shows enough promise as a filmmaker that he could be a cinematic voice to watch out for with future projects.