Critic Reviews

Like the wood-grained farmhouse itself — a beautiful piece of production design by Julie Berghoff — The Conjuring has an analog solidity that makes the terror to come almost unbearable.

I'd be shocked if we see a better horror film in 2013.

Wan masterfully tightens the vise on the audience's nerves, using mood and sound effects for shocks that never feel cheap (the harmless kids' game of hide-and-clap has never been so bloodcurdling).

A sensationally entertaining old-school freakout and one of the smartest, most viscerally effective thrillers in recent memory.

The dread gathers and surges while the blood scarcely trickles in The Conjuring, a fantastically effective haunted-house movie.

The movie belongs to the women, for once, and The Conjuring doesn't exploit or mangle the female characters in the usual ways. Farmiga, playing a true believer, makes every spectral sighting and human response matter; Taylor is equally fine, and when she's playing a "hide-and-clap" blindfold game with her girls, she's like a kid herself, about to get the jolt of her life.

The pervasive aura of creepiness more than compensates for the low body count and inventive use of sharp instrumentation.

The net result is an entertainingly frightening film that keeps the audience in a state of alarmed, but eager, anticipation.

As an exercise in classical scare tactics, delivered through an escalating series of primo setpieces, The Conjuring is often supremely effective.

Wan has marshaled his crack sense of supernatural menace into making his most satisfying scare story yet.