Incantation, (isn't really) the Scariest Movie on Netflix

Dubbed online by people as the “scariest movie on Netflix”, Incantation is a huge foreign, horror film that I was ecstatic to watch. This movie was released a little earlier this year, but since it being the spooky season, I finally checked this one out.

For a brief plot summary: A woman records her life over a span over around 10 years as she is plagued by a mysterious curse affecting her and her daughter. The movie is from Taiwan, so all the dialogue is all in Mandarin. I recommend the subbed version for this one cause the dubbed version is, uh, kinda very bad. Certain deliveries of lines turn out sounding like a bad joke. It really ruins the immersion someone would want in a found-footage movie. In my opinion, the dub just takes away the impact of the actors' talents.

I want to start off with the positives for this film. I love the use of Taiwanese culture and beliefs in this movie. It’s super interesting seeing other cultures in movies, especially if it’s from the countries where they’re most prominent. The use of weird gods and deities was also really cool and added to the creepiness factor for this. There’s also some good ol’ cult stuff going on throughout the whole movie which adds to the unnerving. There are some shots of some pretty good looking body horror which is always cool. The last 10 minutes were pretty creepy and was the best part for me. Some shots actually stayed with me a while after watching it!

And now for the negatives, which unfortunately, I have more of than the positives. I think the whole movie drags on a lot, making it a super slow watch. This is the film's biggest problem. It’s not like a lot of other movies where the slowness fits the tone or is essential to the experience. It’s just slow for the sake of being slow. I think the curse itself takes really long to develop and explain. A lot of the pros I mentioned earlier were only in the movie for not that long and again, took really long to get to.

Overall, (in my opinion) it’s not really the scariest movie on Netflix. I think the concepts are extremely interesting, I just felt it was not really the movie for me.