When it comes to modern horror filmmakers, James Wan is, arguably, the greatest modern mainstream horror director that’s currently working. Obviously, there’s filmmakers like Ari Aster, Robert Eggers and Guillermo del Toro who are terrific horror directors, but their names only apply to a niche audience that doesn’t reach a wider stream level. Jordan Peele might be getting close to that type of level, but he’s still got way more work ahead of him to get to a level of James Wan. But let’s call it what it is: James Wan is the kind of modern horror. He blends together classical horror aesthetics and gives it his Wannisms with his modern approach on terror and great moments of horror. With the two Conjuring movies, Insidious and the first Saw, James Wan is one of the few modern horror directors that opened the door for ushering in the new golden age of horror. He blends together classical horror aesthetics and gives it his Wannisms with his modern approach on terror and great moments of horror. With the two Conjuring movies, Insidious and the first Saw, James Wan is one of the few modern horror directors that opened the door for ushering in the new golden age of horror. It also shows how much his stamped is missed when he leaves franchises. Look at what happened with the third Conjuring adventure or even what happened with the latest Insidious movies. Heck, the Saw franchise is a whole other separate issue by itself, but the bottom line is that he usually promises a great foundation and good will with laying the ground work for the next horror franchise that when it comes to the second or third installment, Wan’s signature is sadly missed. James Wan is also not just known for horror, thankfully. Wan proved that he’s way more talent in him with Aquaman and Furious 7, which aren’t Citizen Kane, but for what they are are great for what they are and it shows great he is at shooting action. Suffice to say, when James Wan career is over he will and should be in the discussion as one of the most gifted and talented directors in the realm of Hollywood. So whenever he puts out a brand new horror movie, the buzz kicks in and Malignant is nothing but greatness, but in an off the wall type of fashion. Malignant is terrifying, insanely bonkers and Wan’s bloodiest film to date. The films production design evokes a classic haunted house but with Wan’s modern and clean aesthetics. The movie takes bold and very unusual directions that all make for a unique horror movie.
Madison (Annabelle Wallis) lives a life with grief and trauma with every passing day, due to the constant and dreadful dreams she’s had from her lost childhood. Madison is having terrifying visions of people being murdered, but she then realizes the murders are happening in real life.
Without getting into spoilers and revealing any crucial plot points, Malignant is absolutely nothing like its marketing campaign. It’s not that the trailers didn’t evoke any kind of enticement for some, but the actual product is not what the movie is trying to sell to audiences. You won’e be spoiled by the trailers or TV ads, but you’ll have a completely different impression when you actually see the movie in all of its bonkers glory. No spoilers, but Malignant is the perfect wacky B horror movie that just doesn’t get made anymore, which is incredibly unfortunate. The first two acts of this movie felt like your traditional James Wan horror movie with suspense and terrific tension, but still having a compliance of camp to it. It was still quite tense and supremly engaging by giving fans of James Wan what they come to expect nowadays. It’s when we get to finale act of Malignant where everything completely escalates to a ludicrous and insane level of horror that James Wan has never done with this style of horror. The finale 30 minutes of Malignant is absolutely wild and technically dexterous. James Wan has always been a master at filmmaking techniques by letting each scene flow and breathe, but especially the final act of this movie is letting Wan go loose by grabbing his paint brush and doing what ever he wanted. The best complement that Malignant can get is that this was James Wan’s making his own Evil Dead, where it delivers on great horror but it effectively demonstrates that the horror movie genre needs more campiness in the modern era.
It’s sad that Annabelle Wallis isn’t in more projects. She’s definitely popped up in some great movies and serves as a great addition to whatever project she’s on board for, but she doesn’t get the attention she deserves among all cinephiles. Annabelle Wallis gives a chilling and euphoric performance by showcasing grief and adversity. Her performance and duality with the other aspects of the narrative are the real meat of the movie. Her performance carries the movie and it really allowed herself to erase the nap of a performance she in one of her earlier horror entries in the film Annabelle.
Joseph Bishara serves as James Wan’s film composer yet again and the relationship they have is the same type of relationship Steven Spielberg and John Williams had back in the day. Anytime Wan puts out a movie, we automatically incline the Joseph Bishara wills serve as the films composer and Bishara knocks it out of the park once again. It’s by far his most versatile and eccentric set of music to date by letting it perfectly sync up with Wan’s style, giving us chills and corresponding with the wackiness and beautiful absurdity of it.
Malignant isn’t on a Conjuring level of quality, but it fully embraces its complete silliness and delivers on effective atmosphere, a spectacular performance from Wallis and stunning violence. It’s refreshing to see a mainstream horror movie from a successful and creative mainstream horror director go down a route of horror that doesn’t get explored enough in the modern day.
My grade for Malignant: B+
Zane's take at the Cinema's 