The Curse of La Llorona
Russia has the Baba Yaga. America has the Boogeyman. Mexico has La Llorona, an evil spirit whose weeping is heard all over and whose endless search for her children has haunted the minds of the children of Mexico for generations. Inevitably, her stature as Mexico’s most infamous and haunting folktale would eventually fall at the feet of a Hollywood studio. What’s interesting, however, is that La Llorona has now made her way into the popular Conjuring universe, which on paper makes complete sense and could’ve been a recipe for success. But while The Curse of La Llorona boasts a few exceptional scares, set-pieces, and sequences, it sadly doesn’t live up to La Llorona’s legendary reputation.
Set in 1970s Los Angeles, Anna Tate-Garcia (Linda Cardellini) is a social worker who recently uncovered a case of supposed child abuse by fellow mother Patricia Alvarez (Patricia Velasquez). Soon enough, Anna realizes Patricia wasn’t hurting her kids, but rather protecting them from La Llorona, an evil entity whose search for children will now put Anna’s own children at risk. Anna must do everything she can to not only learn about La Llorona, but also learn how to vanquish her if she is to save her children.
There’s a tremendous amount of storytelling potential within the story of La Llorona, but the film sadly fails to live up to that potential. Much of the story is simply hindered by an abundantly simplistic and paint-by-numbers script with little depth put into La Llorona herself. All of the characters are your basic cardboard cutouts of the desperate mother, the kids, and the priest/religious figure who helps in the climactic finale.
Linda Cardellini does everything she can with the material she has, and, to be fair, she does give an admirably commendable performance as Anna. Most of the time she displays concern, care, and fear all at once and she does so successfully. She just sadly doesn’t have much to go on as far as character growth goes. Raymond Cruz fits into the second half of the film as the much more eccentric, gritty, and sarcastic Rafael Olvera, a curandero who agrees to assist Anna and her family in vanquishing La Llorona. For the most part his pessimism is played for laughs, albeit effectively, but it’s his hard exterior and grisly persona that makes him a needed jolt of energy for the final act.
Along with Raymond Cruz, a lot of the fun that does come with the film are present within many of the scares it presents. Director Michael Chaves, despite handling a weak script, has proven to be effective in executing fun and creative scares. Many of them rely on La Llorona’s affiliation with water, and for the most part wound up being effective and tense, specifically moments involving a car and a pool. The thing is, most of that fun is sequestered towards the first half of the film, whilst the second half focuses more on the family at the center of the story, and while that should be a good thing, it sadly hinders the story given that the family itself has little to no depth despite the great performances and is only partially saved by Raymond Cruz’s introduction.
What’s most disappointing, however, is how the film treats its titular villainess. As mentioned before, La Llorona is a cultural touchstone in Mexico, a figure revered for her tragic origins and the fear she inspires wherever you hear her cries and wales. The tragedy and despair in her origins are grimly and effectively displayed in the opening few minutes of the film. But sadly, despite the film being called THE CURSE OF LA LLORONA, the film feels more like “An Evil Spirit After a Family That Happens to Feature La Llorona.” The film reduces her stature from a legendary entity among Mexico’s citizens and more like a supernatural villain of the week. It doesn’t help that her strong ties to Mexican culture is not explored enough. Minus a couple moments, the story is centered on a white woman in Los Angeles trying to save her family. I feel there was a lot of potential wasted on a story like this, a story that revolves around a demonic presence that is integral to Mexican folklore.
Overall, The Curse of La Llorona fails to bring its titular character’s immortal reputation of mythical proportions to the big screen. We are treated with a by-the-book ghost story that leaves out much of the material that makes La Llorona’s story interesting. It also doesn’t help that director Michael Chaves will be helming Conjuring 3 in the near future after previous director James Wan had stepped down. All I can do is hope that Chaves takes The Curse of La Llorona and learns from the mistakes he made in the film.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uOV-xMYQ7sk&t=1s&w=585