Quick Synopsis: A rookie police officer takes the last shift at the decommissioned police station where her father worked and killed himself/others. Turns out the hauntings from her past are very literal.

Going to start this review off with something that may be important; Malum is a remake of the 2014 film Last Shift, also directed by Anthony DiBlasi. No I have not watched Last Shift, so I can’t talk about the differences and improvements between the two. I don’t know what DiBlasi changed, what he added, or if it was just a “I have better technology now” situation. I do occasionally put some research into my reviews (I think I put more research into my review for Antlers than the writers of the movie did), but watching an entire film is a bit much. I will say the title is better though. Last Shift is kind of bland and could be any genre, Malum (latin for evil), is definitely a horror movie title.

Now onto Malum itself. I feel I’d like this more if I watched it years ago. Horror movies are a lot like comedy movies, the first time you see something happen in a movie it can be shocking and brilliant, but if every film you watch starts doing that same thing, it can quickly become tiresome, so by the time you see the tenth movie pulling the same tricks, you feel a lot more negatively towards it than you did the first one. This doesn’t mean the tenth film is worse than the first one, but I will give it a negative review because I’m just tired of seeing certain things. Now this isn’t a fault of the movie, I watch a lot of films, so I am exposed to more repetition, reiterations and retellings than most people. With that in mind, Malum does a lot of shit I’m quite frankly just tired of seeing the same old shit in a lot of horror films. I am bored of hallucination horror. Mainly because it always feels like such a fucking cop-out. “oooo spooky stuff, but is it real? we don’t know, and neither will you”. Far too many films are pulling the same tricks, which would be okay if that wasn’t the only way they had scares. I have a limit on how many times I can see the “character witnesses something horrific, but then its not there, did they dream it?” trick pulled in a movie. Pull it off towards the end or at the start, but far too many films have that as the only trick in its arsenal. Specifically, I could do with a 5 year ban on any “Person kills what they think is an evil thing but turns out they were hallucinating and it was actually a relative/friend” scenes in horror movies.

As I said, if I watched this earlier I’d feel much more warmly towards it. There is a fair bit to like about it; the cult aspects are fascinatingly creepy, and the use of practical effects is to be welcomed. I kind of wanted more from the cult. There are two movies; one is about a demonic cult that sacrifices people and who are planning a night of carnage focused on the daughter of an officer who went after them. It’s a very human story, and the idea of her being trapped in a locked building as they try to hunt her is terrifying, especially since her colleagues refuse to help her because of what her dad did (great opening by the way, the scene where her dad shoots Not Jodie Foster is genuinely shocking). It’s simple, but it’s effective. But the other movie is paranormal, where the cult’s tricks work, and they have demonic powers which cause her to hallucinate/control her. And that’s not as effective, as once you see it happen once, you assume that’s the case with every scare. So even at the end where she’s gravely injured after having killed someone, there’s a part of you that assumes it’s just going to cut back and she’s going to be sitting at her desk absolutely fine. The first movie? That’s one I want to see, it’s creative, and incredibly creepy. The second? Seen it. If you cut out the demonic stuff it wouldn’t be as technically impressive, but I think it could end up being an improvement from a narrative standpoint.

It also might have worked better if we went straight from the snuff movies to the police station. If the audience never sees the outside world it would make her world seem smaller and claustrophobic. It’s similar to the Colin Firth “I’m on a boat motherfucker don’t you ever forget” movie from a few years ago. The acting is mostly okay, Jessica Sula has a lot to carry and does it as best as you can hope. Some of the snuff movie sections are great visually, but the vocal performances feel fake.

Overall, I couldn’t help but feel I was watching cutscenes for a horror video game rather than a feature-length, erm, feature. It’s definitely ambitious, but I can’t help but feel it may have worked more if it aimed for something a bit simpler. Although considering how fake some of the dialogue sounds, I can see why they’d feel the need to wow with effects and visuals. The music is pretty damn good though. Like I said, there is a lot to like about Malum. But it’s standing in the shadows of stuff I’ve seen before, mostly Hereditary. Yes, I know the original of this was released 4 years before Hereditary, but this remake was made afterwards, so it might have been advisable to try and avoid comparisons and, I dunno, not make this movie? Or change the hallucination stuff and just focus on the cult-killing people.