The conjuring 2

Rating: 8/10 (19 May 2019)

First, the all-important question: Is The Conjuring 2 scary? Like, jump out of your seat, watch through your outstretched fingers scary? The answer to that is "yes." Under James Wan's direction, even the most clichÃ©d haunted-house tropes (and this movie is bursting with them) are genuinely creepy, and although the movie isn't overly reliant on jump scares, the ones it does use-well, they work. On a lizard-brain level, The Conjuring 2 taps into the universal childhood fear of the dark, and some of its simplest moments-like a little girl hiding under the covers with a flashlight-are its most effective, bolstered by skillfully executed sound design and Don Burgess' gloomy cinematography.