Last Exorcism Part II

         When watching Last Exorcism Part II, I came to the conclusion that Ashley Bell is quite the talented actress. Now if she could stop appearing in movies that feel like total punishment produced by Satan himself, more people might take note of her.

What's up? Ashley Bell continues her role as Nell, a scarred individual trying to recover from the first film's haunting (*andterriblyboringcoughcough*) events. The second she begins to start heading into a normal direction for her life, making friends, getting a job, and finding a possible love interest, everything turns to shit as the demon who possessed her the first time is far from done with her.

What's good? Ashley Bell is clearly the highlight of this movie. She's one of the few who commits to her role and actually makes her character likeable and rootable. It's not even close in quality to anyone reaching her success in this movie.

One other detail I appreciated was the slight twist of an ending. To say things end less then magical is an understatement. For once a PG-13 movie doesn't take the wimpy way out and end like a fairytale.

What the fuck?  For an 88 minute movie, The Last Exorcism will make you feel trapped. There's such little going on here this feels like a commercial about the detoxification of possession as opposed to an actual movie. You're begging for something to happen and nothing does until the last 15 minutes.

To say The Last Exorcism is slow is putting it nicely, you're watching Nell throughout, seeing opportunities for frights but the film never shoots for any of them. It wimps out when it really counts and you're left wondering what could have been.

Everyone orbiting around Nell is a big issue. None of the characters are given any type of dimension or personality it's virtually impossible to give a shit about any of them and I can't even remember what any of their names were. The performances feel terribly bland overall, it's the Nell show with 0% interest given to anyone playing a side character or antagonist to her.

Overall The Last Exorcism is a ridiculously dull and unnecessary sequel with no frights, fun, or humor. A good lead performance and an ending which does spark a bit of interest can't resurrect a movie that's just bland as sin.

1/4