The Reaping

Starts with promise but loses its way by the time it ends. Hillary Swank, Idris Elba are good and have good characters but what starts off as a faith based horror thriller eventually finds itself losing its narrative and focus when if it had committed to what it was originally had in mind it would have been more enjoyable. With that being said, its watchable and does provide some food for thought.

What starts off as a promising bit of faith-based horror quickly loses it's way. After an a pretty exciting and creepy foray into a mysterious river of blood, we are left to wade through a confusing middle chapter that's a bit of a slog only to come to arrive at a final act that feels half-baked. The results are ultimately unsatisfying, but the strange combination of ideas is still compelling. The film's visual style is reminiscent of the dark fairy tale imagery one would find in Guillermo del Toro's more celebrated and original works. This movie ultimately doesn't reach the same heights as a del Toro movie as it ends up diving too much into gothic melodrama. At least it's a very pretty film that looks different than the vast majority of horror movies out there. It does have a strange made-for-TV vibe going for it though. It's shot in a weird soap opera style and the performances are a little basic with the exception of Idris Elba who is the highlight of the film. This all does make sure the movie is certainly original and interesting because of that, but it does little on the quality front. By far the most disappointing aspect of the movie outside of it's lack of narrative focus is that it really doesn't have anything to say about religious faith. You'll see characters who are Christian, and these are definitely Biblical plagues going on, but outside of that first plague that kicks things off, the movie sort of leaves God in the backseat until the end as a way of giving some sort of explanation for all the weirdness happening in this small town. The rest of the plagues are just there to try and give you the heebie-jeebies by being strange. In the end this is both a watchable and sometimes fascinating movie, but one that sadly isn't executed as well as it could have been and left me wanting more. 6.5/10