In The Dawn, a father and husband murders his family with a hammer but one daughter escapes thanks to the help of a kindly and old Native American’s intervention. I just watched this yesterday and I honestly don’t remember why this old fellow is hanging around since I think the father guy is maybe American and the wife sounds Scottish so I doubt t he’s a relative but there he is anyway, helpful, wise and sage. The next morning the little girl is immediately found hiding in the woods by two charming policemen and shipped off to an orphanage / convent where “he was brought up” (the policeman) but is an all girl place. A mere edit later and we are transformed into the future where the girl is grown and played by Devaney Pinn who some of you might know from a number of different horror movies she pops up in – IMDB calls them “independent films”. For the next 45 minutes nothing at all happens and you might be thinking of deleting the app you’re watching this on forever and just giving up on horror movies involving nuns.

I think somewhere in here maybe there’s some good concepts and good ideas but sheesh o Pete sometimes nothing at all happens for what seems like hours but if we keep everything in perspective because that’s how we were taught, there’s much worse on the chart below. I feel like anyone who reads out here is my friend and I appreciate you so I can’t say “hi friend you should watch this especially if you like being bored and seeing snowy drone shots from above a house and you really like Devaney Pinn and well of course a bunch of nuns and priests and praying and stuff and the typical creepy priest guy with the perv haircut who you just knows does things like peeping or illegal touching but it’s never shown or anything oh and there’s an exorcism the power of Christ compels you the power of Christ compels you I have dreams of rosaries and falling down a long flight of stairs.” Because that’s probably something similar to what I would say in person because somehow I always make things weird like the other day I was talking to this lady at work and for some reason I thought it was a good idea to tell her that when I was a kid I had red hair and that had nothing to do with anything really.

But like I said some of the horror elements in here are good when they do them. Like when they show her first onscreen possession or when she rips that guy’s jaw off. or even when they (kind of) explain what’s going on. But then there’s also a lot of tedium infinitum so to speak so you’ll probably lose interest almost immediately. There’s also a very small and quick bit in there that I was all “huh?” and “wait” and then – well see the PS at the bottom here. Plus, what would a nun horror movie be without someone opening up and screaming out a mouthful of CGI flies?

So nuns and Devaney Pinn and lots of sweeping drone shots and fake flies and blah blah blah blah blah nothing too exciting to see here. There’s some intermittent clips of her possessed and screaming that might do the trick for you but just only feebly maybe. I never have been able to truly tell what makes people tick aside from you know how you know when you meet good people.

I might as well drop some spoilers here since I’ve covered everything else we could do with this thing. Whenever you might make it towards the end they do a switcharoo and hey guess what she’s been there for years in this possessed state and all of the boring good things she’s seen are just imaginations or tricks by the devil and she’s all the way fucked for good but here comes the exorcist and we’ll see if he can save the day and guess what –

FILED UNDER: BLAHBITY BLAHBITY BLAHBITY FLIES AND DEVILS AND A TRAIN

Here’s the updated diagram – worshipped by our ancestors at Gobekli Tepe and prophesied to endure long after the fall of the civilization of man:

PS somehow the filmmakers worked it out that this is some sort of prequel to the Amityville horror for real and we all know those Amityville movies are about the flies the goddamned flies

P.S. 2 – the other day i was trying to show my friend our lovely work here and it it was really hard to see on my phone so I made a page where it should hopefully be able to be squeezed and moved around more for more visibility on a mobile device while me or you or someone you love is trying to show your pastor or rabbi. Or grandma. Or if you’re a redecorator and modelling this as new wallpaper for someone’s downstairs bathroom. That guest bathroom with that sliding door that no one really ever uses except when they’re down in the lower room playing pool or just drinking too much champagne and have to go take a quick piss. That one.