Ouija: Origin of Evil Movie Review

If you love to live dangerously and are brave enough to play the Ouija board game, remember the basic three rules:

1. never play alone,
2. never play in a graveyard, and
3. always say ‘goodbye’ when you end the game.

Don’t break the rules if you don’t want something bad to happen as that the Zander family experiences in Ouija: Origin of Evil.

Ouija: Origin of Evil is a prequel to 2014 Mike Flanagan’s solid horror Ouija. The story focuses on a widow named Alice Zander (played by Elizabeth Reaser) who works as a fortune teller accompanied by her teenage daughter Paulina Zander (Annalise Basso) and nine-year old daughter Doris (Lulu Wilson). Unbeknownst to their clients, they stage out their séances with magnets under the table.

One night, Paulina sneaks out from her room to go to a party at her friend’s house. There, they play a Ouija, and Paulina suggests that Alice consider incorporating the game in her readings. While testing her board manipulation technique, Alice unknowingly contacts a spirit named Marcus, that later begins to possess Doris. Alice does a fatal mistake after she tested the game: she ends the game without saying “goodbye”. After Alice left her practice room, her daughter Doris sneaks and uses the board alone. She contacts a number of spirits, and one of them is her deceased father Roger.

The next day, Father Tom (Henry Thomas) calls Alice to school about Dories’ homework written in cursive despite having not taught the handwriting style, and Doris herself cites that her new “friend” helped her. One night Doris briefly speaks in another person’s voice and later begins a sharp pain in her neck, and then a shadowy figure appears and possesses Doris by crawling into her mouth.

The strange changes in Doris make Lina curious and trying to find out the causes of it. With a help from Father Tom, slowly Lina and Alice figure out the secret behind their house.

If you watch the trailer before watching this movie, you might expect to find many jump scares, terrifying images or scary ghosts in the movie. Normally, a horror movie with children as main characters is spooky in my eyes, but this one doesn’t give me that kind of scare. Usually I will watch the movie between my fingers but when watching this movie, 90% of the time I watch it with my eyes wide open. It also didn’t leave me breathless.

It’s also kind of blurry about what really caused the terror: the history hidden in the house, or Alice’s mistake of not saying “goodbye” after playing with Ouija. When I was watching it I expected to see more twist and mind blowing facts about the house they live in, but I didn’t. I’m kind of disappointed.

However, I don’t say that this movie is bad. This is a good movie, it has a good cinematography, perfectly arranged sound and lighting, and excellent properties. I really love movies with vintage setting and Ouija: Origin of Evil doesn’t fail for it. And if you are claustrophobic, this movie will seem kind of unsettling.

Ouija: Origin of Evil is a good alternative if you want an entertaining horror movie. If you are a fan of scary ghosts or plot twists, this movie probably will not meet your expectation. And don’t worry, if you haven’t watched the previous movie, you’ll not get confused with the plot. For the ‘awkward’ ending of this movie, I hope there will be a sequel in the future.

This movie is now playing in XXI, Studio21, and CGV Blitz theaters in your city.