Publication Date: 09-04-2025

Annabelle: Creation (2017) review

Dir. David F. Sandberg

By: Steve Pulaski

Rating: ★★

Before seeing Annabelle: Creation, I feared the moviegoing experience I planned surrounding the movie would hinder my opinion of it in the positive sense.

I saw the film at the newly remodeled and reopened Geneva Theater in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, a theater once home to sets created by the Marx Brothers and even Bela Lugosi. For the past several years, it was nothing more than a decaying building of rust and water damage, practically begging to be given a few strong knocks by the shovel of a rickety bulldozer. Fortunately enough, it reopened bearing a strong commitment to its history and legacy, and provided one of the most memorable trips to the theater of my life.

As I settled into my comfortable black leather chair with the aura of a bygone theater style and architecture engulfing me, I feared that my enthusiasm for the Geneva Theater would make me think Annabelle: Creation might’ve been better than it was. Films like Take Me Home Tonight and The Final Destination have admittedly had my initial thoughts clouded by nostalgia and experience, making for a shaky review all around. But given the generic, unremarkable nature of Annabelle: Creation as a whole, it wasn’t hard to see through the film’s rues as another lackluster chiller with telegraphed scares and a linear plotline of rehashed devices and tricks.

The film revolves around the plight of several orphan girls, led by Sister Charlotte (Stephanie Sigman) as well as husband and wife Samuel and Esther Mullins (Anthony LaPaglia and Miranda Otto). The two primary girls the film chooses as the victims, er, main characters, are Janice (Taliha Bateman) and Linda (Lulu Wilson). After being stricken with polio, Janice is focused on a smooth recovery despite needing special treatment in the form of a walker as well as a wall-mounted stair-lift in order to get to her bedroom. Meanwhile, Linda is set on simply having one friend she can talk to, taking solace in a doll she clings to that somewhat resembles her.

So from that description alone, you know the haunted Annabelle doll, which has become a cultural staple as much as it has become a recognizable inclusion in the larger Conjuring franchise, will go on to pray on the vulnerable members of this household. This demon is apparently unleashed by the girls disturbing the Mullins’ late daughter’s room. For 100 minutes, it wreaks havoc amongst the unassuming, 1950s-style home in the form of slamming doors and abrupt movements that inspire jarring but predictable synths on the film’s soundtrack.

It gets exhausting to see the same routine scares repeated over again as if they’ve somehow never been employed, but take note of how The Darkness, The Disappointments Room, Morgan, The Devil Inside, The Forest, Rings, and the lesser installments of the Paranormal Activity franchise carried themselves and you’ll see Annabelle: Creation can’t be bothered to include anything of higher value.

The film is a prequel to the 2014 film Annabelle, which was a spin-off of the 2013 film The Conjuring which would later inspire the 2016 sequel. In just four short years, this promising franchise, largely helmed by James Wan, the gifted name of horror in the new millennium, has become a breeding ground off which inferior horror titles and premises are inspired. The original Annabelle film was a watchable, if basic, rendition of the jump-scares and ploys we grew accustomed to at that time; it was played out, but not to the extent it was today. By now, we expect more, and Annabelle: Creation doesn’t deliver.

My more-than-modest hopes for the film came as a result of Ouija: Origin of Evil being better than I, or anyone, expected it to be. The prequel to the epitome of everything wrong with the horror genre also illustrated what could be done with a film’s premise if taken seriously and artfully, beyond what was considered of the status quo. Annabelle: Creation, outside of the aesthetic and the film’s commitment to a retro style that deserves praise, shows what happens when art must sacrifice itself to appeal to the masses, and the result, as expected, is as pretty as an unkempt, sweaty demon face instead of a beautifully rebuilt movie theater.

My review of The Conjuring (2013)
My review of The Conjuring 2
My review of The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It
My review of The Conjuring: Last Rites
My review of Annabelle (2014)
My review of The Nun (2018)
My review of The Curse of La Llorona

Starring: Taliha Bateman, Lulu Wilson, Anthony LaPaglia, Stephanie Sigman, and Miranda Otto. Directed by: David F. Sandberg.