solid, but not as outstanding as some of the first page reviews

Rating: 6/10 (20 November 2013)

I'll start by saying that I enjoyed this film, but the film suffers from a few things.
The first. "The Conjuring" fails to conjure-up ANY new ideas. We've seen all this before, and stylistically the film doesn't offer anything to separate it from those other, similar films. I'd give the film a 7 on the scare-meter, but I thought the look was a bit too 'dry-70's-drab'.
The second. The film fails miserably in the music department. We get one or two 70's songs thrown-in-the-mix, but where is the traditional score, and the creepy music?
The film just lacked that extra-ooomf. It's really hard to explain, but I'll try.
THe film needs a more serious threat. There's not ENOUGH carnage here. I don't need a slaughterhouse, but bumps and bruises are about as serious as this threat gets. They had the opportunity to take it over the top and off a couple of meaningless characters, but they failed to do it. I understand that they're keeping true to a so-called true story, but who cares about the historical accuracy of any of this? Honestly?
So what did I like? What effects are here - are done well. The overall production values are high, the acting is solid because the cast is solid and the writing is fine.
There is a parallel narrative to this story which goes unexplained and really serves only one purpose - to plant a seed for a possible sequel.
Call me crazy, but I enjoyed Aja's "Maniac" as much as I liked this(just to throw-out the last horror film I watched). "Maniac" had no scares, but at least it had a little style. "Halloween" and "House of the Devil" put a little flair into the seventies - this didn't.
It's funny how we sometimes put films like this on a pedestal, perhaps because the genre has been struggling to regain form, but I found this to be no better than other lower-rated films like "The Haunting in Connecticut", and not much better than some very average entries into the genre like "The Last Exorcism" or "Dark Skies". It's amazing, having just said that, how much this movie uses from those last three films.
Yet Another comparison would be "Sinister" which is currently rated .7 lower than this, but I found that movie definitely HAD that something extra. The style, the creepiness, the music,... those IMDb-scores should be flip-flopped imo, but this is a newer release. I suspect the scores will get a little closer as time goes by.
There were also a couple of things about "The Conjuring" that I thought were a little inconsistent. Two that stand out came towards the end of the film(WARNING SUPER SMALL MEANINGLESS SPOILER ALERT). The first was when days after showing the family sleeping in one room, and after they had been through enough to never separate again, the film goes right back to showing one of the girls sleeping alone in a bedroom. By that point of the film it would have never happened... ever.. another moment of awkwardness for me came when Lily's character(the mom) steps out of the house and into the light and all of her injuries/bruising etc disappears.. I understand the thought, but the thought stinks. It would have added more credence to everything if those bruises remained. Those weren't the only little problems like this, but I've made my point.
I don't mean to discourage anyone from seeing this because IT IS above average, and better than most of the crap in terms of new release horror.. just don't go into it with high expectations... might have been part of the problem for me.
See Sinister first if you haven't. And if you watch this and like it - try out ALL the films I've mentioned previously.
63/100