Film Review – The Conjuring 2

In a rather erratic career of hits and misses, director James Wan scored a major creative and box office victory with 2013’s “The Conjuring.” The summertime scary movie managed to unnerve audiences by repackaging old suspense tricks, while its foray into the case files of real-world paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren organically opened itself up to franchise possibilities, already explored to a slight degree in the 2014 spin-off, “Annabelle.” “The Conjuring 2” is a sequel with serious potential, but Wan isn’t comfortable with opportunity, eschewing the lean construction of the original film for a bloated, repetitive follow-up that’s certainly filled with frights, but lacks an engrossing story and variety of nightmare imagery. Much like his own “Insidious: Chapter 2,” Wan ruins a good thing by overthinking the obvious. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com