Ouija: Origin of Evil -- my take on the movie with spoilers!

PLOT SUMMARY: A con artist and her daughters unwittingly allow a demon to enter when she uses an ouija board.

It’s no surprise that evil chooses and possesses young innocent girls in horror movies. They are, after all, thought to be pure of heart and their innocence is alluring to all evil.

I would hold the opinion that pure heart would be tougher to infiltrate and those who have committed sins- big or small- would be the ones who could be manipulated by evil spirits. However, in movies, it is always the youngest girl in the family who becomes the target of demons. Perhaps it is because we viewers, easily sympathize with the sweet little girl who is yet to learn that the world outside isn’t harmless.

OUIJA: ORIGIN OF EVIL Movie Plot 

The movie takes place in 1967, a time when life was thought to be simple. Except, it wasn’t. Bullying was prevalent in schools, people were conning others out of their hard-earned money and high school kids loved dabbling in creepy games that summoned spirits.

We are immediately introduced to the Zander family consisting of a mother and two daughters who scam families into believing their dead loved ones are trying to contact them. The mother repeatedly assures her youngest daughter Doris that they are only helping people move on from their grief.

The eldest, Lina, is a little sceptical and is still inwardly grieving the death of her father. One day, the mother buys an ouija board to change the game of her scam and that’s when trouble starts to brew. For, unwittingly, the family breaks a rather rigid rule of playing the spiritual board game: never play in a graveyard.

OUIJA: ORIGIN OF EVIL Ending Explained with Spoilers! 

Turns out, in a creepy twist- the family lives in a house where a mad doctor used to perform cruel experiments on his patients and then buries them. So basically, the house is actually a graveyard!

There are a lot of scares- Doris is indeed one crazy, fearsome possessed girl. Playing a puppet by the demon, Doris invokes fear and prevails even as the family tries to bring her back.

In the end, evil triumphs. Though Lina sews Doris’ mouth shut, the evil spirits escape and use Lina to kill her mother.

Two months later, Doris’ body is still missing, Lina is in an asylum for killing her mother. Shaken by the happenings, she has lost control of herself and in order to summon her sister, uses her blood to create an ouija board.

The final scene shows Doris walking upside down on the ceiling.

Scary? Yes. Chilling, yes. Satisfactory ending? Can’t exactly say that.

Doris’ mystery is never fully explained. Her mouth was sewn shut, so is that how the demons escaped, knowing without her mouth, they can’t spread their terror? Was Doris already dead and all this time was being used as a puppet by the demon?

Who took her body away? Who is possessing her now? The mother does see the soul of her daughter right before she dies, so we know that Doris did find peace. It doesn’t, however, explain the ending scene.

Apart from this tiny bit, the movie was a well-made one. It doesn’t drag and straight away gets to the point- the kind of horror movies I actually enjoy.

Scare Scale: 3.5/5