Annabelle 2014

Wesley Morris, Grantland: What about this movie is supposed to scare us? Read more

Kyle Smith, New York Post: While the film isn't clever or original, it is reasonably scary, especially when it knocks off the preliminaries and gets to the good stuff. Read more

Ben Kenigsberg, New York Times: Mr. Leonetti embraces the potential of negative space. Read more

Richard Corliss, TIME Magazine: Quality is often irrelevant in a horror movie; shock is the key. Read more

Scott Foundas, Variety: The scares are cheap but periodically effective. Read more

A.A. Dowd, AV Club: Billed as a spin-off of The Conjuring, the film operates more like a shoddy brand extension; it cost five times less than its predecessor, and the slashed budget shows-both in the economy casting and in the over-lit, sometimes hideous digital imagery. Read more

Bill Goodykoontz, Arizona Republic: Where "The Conjuring" was more of a full meal. "Annabelle" just leaves you hungry for more. Read more

Peter Keough, Boston Globe: Though it features a plucky female protagonist, "Annabelle" still possesses the same medieval attitude toward women as "The Conjuring," reducing the gender to the extremes of self-sacrificing mother and malevolent toy. Read more

Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune: Each time a character gets tossed in the air by some manifestation or another, the effect is cheesy. Still, I've seen worse. Read more

Greg Tasker, Detroit News: Although [Leonetti] covers no new ground - things are largely predictable - he pays tribute to horror classics such as "Rosemary's Baby." Read more

Kyle Anderson, Entertainment Weekly: For a superior experience, go buy a disturbing-looking doll that says ''Don't go see Annabelle'' when you pull its string. Read more

Frank Scheck, Hollywood Reporter: The film is ultimately so generic and formulaic that you'll probably forget it by the time you get home. Read more

Robert Abele, Los Angeles Times: "Annabelle" works enough devil figurine juju to make for a modestly hair-raising prequel to the more satisfying scares of its predecessor, "The Conjuring." Read more

Bruce Diones, New Yorker: The script, by Gary Dauberman, is a cliched mess, lacking humor and surprises. But Leonetti stages some fright-worthy sequences ... Read more

Graham Fuller, New York Daily News: A vortex of visual cliches beyond rescue. Read more

Tirdad Derakhshani, Philadelphia Inquirer: As undistinguished, uninteresting, and unscary as the worst of the Chucky films. Read more

Peter Hartlaub, San Francisco Chronicle: The movie tries to be more than just a creepy doll freakout, and delivers the requisite scares. Read more

Kristin Tillotson, Minneapolis Star Tribune: In horror, there really is nothing new left to discover under the devil moon, so the secret to startling audiences, or at least raising hairs on the backs of necks, lies in deft direction and editing, both missing here. Read more

Joe Williams, St. Louis Post-Dispatch: "Annabelle" is so lazily coat-tailing on Roman Polanski, they should have called it "Rosemary's Barbie." Read more

Bruce Demara, Toronto Star: If you're sighing heavily at the thought of yet another stupid horror movie involving an evil doll, here's a pleasant surprise: Annabelle is actually rather decent at raising the goose bumps. Read more

Joshua Rothkopf, Time Out: Laughworthy bumps in the night, creaky rocking chairs, a demon-infested basement and more gliding baby carriages than an '80s De Palma film. Read more

Claudia Puig, USA Today: The story is a mishmash of demonic possession, Satanic killings, machines suddenly switching on and off and vacantly-staring figurines. It's more familiar than frightening. And the human actors are no more compelling than the poker-faced dolls. Read more

Simon Abrams, Village Voice: Annabelle, an effective prequel to horror pastiche The Conjuring, surpasses its predecessor simply by virtue of occasionally being scary. Read more

Bilge Ebiri, New York Magazine/Vulture: What we mostly get in Annabelle is what we've gotten from so many other horror films: creaking floors, funky white-robed figures, home appliances that go off on their own, mysterious writing that shows up in mysterious places. Read more

Michael O'Sullivan, Washington Post: It has its unnerving moments, but they're outweighed by the sheer stupidity and predictability of the story. Read more