WHEN EVIL LURKS (2023) Review

When Evil Lurks is in UK cinemas and streaming on Shudder now.

Synopsis

The residents of a small rural town discover that a demon is about to be born among them. They desperately try to escape before the evil is born, but it may be too late.

Review

As far as horror films go Where Evil Lurks puts itself in the twisted psychological possession genre when it is more of a thinker rather than a visual horror, although there are a few scenes that will make you squirm.

The film is based in a small unassuming farming village, a quaint village where there is a big community feel and nothing much of note ever really happens. That is until eerie goings on begin to happen, two brothers Pedro (Ezequiel Rodríguez) and the younger Jimmy (Demián Salomón) investigate gunshots heard in the distance, this is when they find the grizzly remains of a “cleaner” who was originally sent to help a young child has fallen strangely ill or is “rotten” taking on a grotesque looking figure giving the religious family cause for concern and them wanting to keep the potential demonic being under wraps from the rest of the community.

The only thing to do is to call in the local “expert” to remove him to protect the rest of the family and community, this is where things go horribly wrong and the movement of the body actually brings more harm than good to the locals with whatever was growing inside the young boy now being unleashed into the world as a strange greenish pus leaks from the body. What transpires is a horrifically catestrophic sequence of events that rip apart the community from the very core.

There is no doubt that Where Evil Lurks is a chillingly dark film but for me personally it never really went anywhere. The direction of the film from Demián Rugna looked good but the story just didn’t resonate with me, the dialogue was in Argentinian and was a little difficult to follow with that in mind the story kind of lost itself and it was difficult for me to pick out the key moments. Visually the movie worked and the main acting came across well with Ezequiel Rodríguez and Demián Salomón working well as the key characters bringing across the terrifying nature of the story.

Verdict

Overall the film didn’t really work for me. Visually it chilled but the storyline just didn’t hit the right note for me. With it being available to stream now on Shudder it may be worth having a look and making your own mind up but for me it was an average film at best.

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