The Last Exorcism Part II

Three years since the properly good and properly scary original, the ridiculously titled The Last Exorcism Part II is finally upon us, having jettisoned pretty much everything about the original movie that we loved. Gone is the troubled priest and secluded setting, as this movie focuses on Nell (Ashley Bell) who was the demonically plagued victim from the original. Also gone is the found footage format, and the last time a good horror film dropped the found footage for its sequel, we wound up with the abysmal The Blair Witch Project 2. Unfortunately, things are even worse this time around.

Pretty much ignoring the apocalyptic finale of the first movie, the sequel finds Nell in a half-way house in New Orleans, trying to put her life together again. The other girls in the house introduce her to modern life, which includes the likes of bad language, rock'n'roll and - gasp! - BOYS! It's not long before Nell is being plagued by visions (or is she?) of her dead father (or is he?), and some odd, vaguely supernatural goings on; levitations, possessions, birds flying suicidally into windows, the youge.

It's difficult to quantify just how awful a film The Last Exorcism Part II is; from the almost universally terrible acting (save for Bell, who does a good job at being vulnerable), to the complete lack of tension, to the overall cheapness of the film despite it costing almost three times as much as the original. The tone of the film ranges from unbearably dull to outright confusing to laughably bad. The dialogue feels like a new low for modern horror; people talk about phantom pregnancies on first dates, and someone covered in blood is scolded for being missing for the last few hours BEFORE being asked why they are covered in blood. People just do things with reason or rhyme, like the script was written by fifteen different people, none of whom were talking to each other.

The biggest fright in a movie about the devil is when a neighbour's dog suddenly and loudly barks. Yes, The Last Exorcism Part II is the worst horror of 2013 so far, and would be the worst movie of the year full stop if it weren't for the existence of Scary Movie 5.