WE SUMMON THE DARKNESS is a crafty little badger. As part of the modern ‘Satanic Panic’ and ‘1980’s’ resurgence we’ve seen in horror cinema it plays a fun little game with our expectations and biases going in and mostly manages to keep its ball of string together.
The story for WE SUMMON THE DARKNESS follows three young women out on the road and heading towards a heavy metal concert. The three of them are loud, are obnoxious, and are having the time of their lives. The girls arrive at their concert and quickly meet some equally obnoxious male fans of the band they are all there to see and the group decides to spend the evening together. Once the fun of the show is done though the gang all decide to head to the home of one of the girls and to keep the party going. Alas, there’s been a rash of ritualistic murders happening in that area and it seems like the one thing the killer/s are drawn to is the darkness heavy metal and its fans find comfort in.
This is one of those movies that seems to come out of nowhere and just nails what it is trying to do. The performances are fantastic with Alexandra Daddario coming out on fire. Really though, the charm of the film is that everyone commits, and you can tell. The film is well made, well shot, and well directed, but the big flaw here is that the story doesn’t quite stretch to fit the film. It’s close. Very close. It just feels like it needed a little more something. Which isn’t to say this is a bad film or mediocre at all. It’s a fun movie and well worth a look. It definitely plays with your expectations. Heck, even the final payoff is good. I just feel like a little more darkness could have been summoned here. As it stands the film straddles horror and comedy pretty well and knows when to amplify one aspect or the other.
Certainly not perfect, and easy to miss in the forest that has become throwback horror films, it’s definitely worth a look and there are too many bad and mediocre horror films out there to let the entertaining ones pass us by.
3.5 out of 5
The Spooky World of Chris Ringler 