By Katherine Tavarez
Staff Writer
An Ouija board is not your everyday Monopoly board game. While it may look like a children’s game, spiritualists believe that the board allows the living to communicate with the dead.
“Ouija,” an American supernatural horror film directed by Stiles White, was released on Oct. 24, 2014. Despite receiving low critical scores, the movie was a hit with audiences, receiving $103.6 million at the worldwide box office.
Last month, two years after its original release, a Mike Flanagan-directed sequel was released. On Oct. 21, Universal Studios released “OUIJA: Origin of Evil.” It has nearly grossed over $45 million in two weeks and has received many positive reviews from critics, who have praised the film as an improvement from “Ouija.”
The first “Ouija” seemed to take place in present times, but “OUIJA: Origin of Evil” takes us back to the ‘60s. A widowed mother, Al An Ouija board is not your everyday Monopoly board game. While it may look like a children’s game, spiritualists believe that the board allows the living to communicate with the dead.
“Ouija,” an American supernatural horror film directed by Stiles White, was released on Oct. 24, 2014. Despite receiving low critical scores, the movie was a hit with audiences, receiving $103.6 million at the worldwide box office.
Last month, two years after its original release, a Mike Flanagan- directed sequel was released. On Oct. 21, Universal Studios released “OUIJA: Origin of Evil.” It has nearly grossed over $45 million in two weeks and has received many positive reviews from critics, who have praised the film as an improvement from “Ouija.”
The first “Ouija” seemed to take place in present times, but “OUIJA: Origin of Evil” takes us back to the ‘60s. A widowed mother, Alice (Elizabeth Reaser), and her two daughters, Paulina (Annalise Basso) and Doris (Lulu Wilson), are busy running a scam; they trick customers into believing they are talking to dead loved ones. Although it is a hoax, Alice is desperate to support her children and truly believes that they are helping people find closure. But in reality, it’s all a lie. After using their own methods, Alice runs into an Ouija board at a store while shopping for home goods and decides to buy it to add as a prop.
While using the board, Doris begins to actually make contact with the dead. Doris makes new spiritual friends and helps her mom with psychic issues. She even finds some money in the walls of the house thanks to a tip from one of her spiritual contacts. Later in the film, we come across Father Tom (Henry Thomas), the principal of the school that Doris and Paulina attend. Father Tom doesn’t accomplish anything when it comes to the family’s battle against the spirits conjured by the Ouija board, although he was asked to help out with Doris as she encounters a spirit within her. Doris’ behavior begins to get strange and unpredictable, leading to horrifying, growing evil revelations.
It is safe to say that “Origin of Evil” is an improvement over its predecessor. It keeps the focus on the family. The production design really helps with the creepy atmosphere. The leap in quality from the first film to this one is impressive.
OUIJA: Origin of Evil is rated PG-13 and is now playing in theaters.
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