Tarot (2024)-- My take on the movie with spoilers

 

Plot: A group of friends play with the Tarot cards and end up being haunted by the creatures depicted in the cards.

First things first: Tarot is absolutely nothing like Nicholas Adam's Horrorscope.

The young adult novel was one of my favorites which is why I was so excited when an adaptation was announced.

Suffice to say, the filmmakers butchered the concept and the movie comes off as so ridiculous you wonder if you are watching a horror or a badly made horror comedy.

The book's main theme was about a student who hid her identity as the school paper's astrologer and is shocked to find that a serial killer has been using her predictions to kill off her friends.

There was a bit of romance, a lot of intrigue, and the thrills were absolutely chilling. Even the way the victims was killed was horrifying.

TAROT does nothing but follow all horror tropes instead of sticking to the plot of the book it is supposed to be adapted from. There is nothing new or innovative. All the creatures arrive in the same way, by showing their long, bony fingers creeping up the corner.

And of course there is an old woman who ends up giving the back story and was also a survivor, yet she is killed the second she decides to help the protagonist.

Tarot will neither scare you nor entertain. As a horror fan, you have already watched all of this before and will find your attention wavering.

It is disappointing to watch a movie that could have done so much more considering the concept.

TAROT Movie Plot

The movie begins with a woman's silhouette against a fireplace. She is scratching something on the floor but we find out what is going on only later.

Enter seven friends who are off to celebrate a friend's birthday.

The seven friends are Haley, Grant, Paxton, Paige, Madeline, Lucas, and Elise.

It is Elise's birthday and all the friends chose a mansion in the middle of nowhere to celebrate it.

They are all outside and playing the Most Likely to...drinking game when Haley and Grant reveal that they have broken up and definitely not most likely to marry.

The friends decide to continue drinking but Grant finds to his disappointment that there is only one beer can left.

The friends decide to get or order more but realize they are in the middle of nowhere. Paxton thinks that in a house so big there is bound to be hidden liquor so they go around looking for it.

And of course, they head to a basement where they find a room filled with artifacts and whatnot.

Paxton finds a box of cards and Haley discovers it is Tarot cards, hand painted ones at that. The friends encourage her to do a reading since she has studied astrology.

Haley tells them that it is a bad idea to use someone else's deck but her friends tell her to break the rules and she complies immediately.

And so off they go and get Tarot readings done because it is much more fun than charades apparently.

If only they had played charades...

Haley does Elise's reading first. She's a Libra and is told that she will be climbing a ladder to success. Her card is the High Priestess

Paige is told that her Magician card reveals that a big change will come.

Paxton goes to the washroom and experiences a creepy moment before joining his friend.

Madeline is told that her Hanged Man card reveals she will run from danger.

Lucas gets the Hermit card which foretells that he will get money as well as love.

Madeline blushes and tells her friends to stop it when they tease her.

So okay, Madeline and Lucas have a thing for each other.

Paxton eventually gives in and is told that the Fool card means that he will be a helpful friend.

Grant is reluctant but gives in and sits down across from her. She tells him the Devil card reveals that he will have to make a sacrifice if he wants to save the person he cares about.

Haley then does her own reading. She picks up the death card and predicts that love will lead to her death.

Grant and Haley get into argument and it is obvious there is still some tension between them.

The next morning, the friends get in their cars and return to their campus. Lucas picks up a lottery card and ends up winning some money. At least part of Haley's  prediction has come true.

Later, Elise is in her room and on the phone with Paige when she hears noises in the corridor. She thinks the girls have returned and goes out to see the ladder from the attic is down. There is no one else around and sends the ladder back up.

The noises return and she goes back to see the ladder down again. This time she climbs it and finds does of candles lit all around the entrance. They are all set in the shape of the Libra symbol.

Elise sees the High Priestess card before her. She picks it up and gets spooked when the creature from the card comes before her and screams.

She tumbles backwards and falls down the ladder. Paige calls again and Elise tries to crawl towards her phone when she is pulled back right to the spot under the ladder.

The High Priestess monster drops the ladder on her repeatedly until Elise died and blood splatters on the phone. Most of this happens off screen so the audience doesn't have to suffer through to graphic violence.

But even if the kills are done off screen, they could still have been impactful. Rather, they come off as a tame attempt to be something more. While we are spared the unnecessary blood and gory deaths, the scenes were an opportunity to show just how frightful the creatures could be.

The subsequent kills are also good ideas that are executed clumsily, or rather lazily.

Or perhaps there were budget cuts.

Anyway, getting back to it, the friends find out about Elise's death and are saddened. Paige, who may have feelings for Elise, is devastated.

Haley stays with her and tells Paige that she doesn't need to feel guilty or blame herself for what happened to Elise. She then proceeds to talk about herself and how when her mother was sick, she did several Tarot card readings to get a different result but they all ended up giving the same negative

result.

For some reason, this scene just shows Haley making everything about herself even though the intention must not have been so.

The scene shifts to Lucas dropping Madeline in front of her house before going off to the subway station.

Once there, he feels like he is being followed and sees glimpses of a creature. He begins to find a place to hide and ends up going through a restricted area. Just like in the reading, Haley had said he does like breaking the rules.

Lucas tries to hide but the Hermit monster pushes him in front of an incoming train.

The friends gather once again at the police station where Paxton demands to know what is going on with their friends or if they may be getting murdered.

The detectives assure the friends that their friends died in unfortunate accidents. The friends then regroup and discuss what may be going on.

Haley believes her readings may be coming true. Grant is skeptic about it and Haley takes Paxton's laptop without his permission to search online.

She comes across a tarot reader and astrologer called Alma Astrom. The name is supposed to be an anagram?

Anyway, Paige calls the number on the website but since it goes straight to voicemail, Haley takes the keys and decides to go on a road trip.

Grant is still in disbelief and doesn't support the idea that something supernatural may be occurring.

The friends make the long drive to Alma's house only for her to tell them to get off her property.

Haley manages to get through to her with her "but my friends are dying" speech.

Alma invites them all in and asks for the deck Haley used. She doesn't have it. Alma is able to describe it because over the decades, those who have used it haven't survived.

Alma's friends were killed too when she did their reading. Since she didn't do her own, she survived.

She tells Haley to destroy the deck but before that tells her of a story of an astrologer in the 1700s. She had predicted death for the Count's pregnant wife and when it came true, the Count labelled her a witch. The astrologer's daughter was hung and so she swore revenge on the Count and his friends. After she put a curse on them using the cards and some hair and twigs and stuff, she killed herself inside a ritual circle so that her blood flowed in a design towards the box. Now that her spirit was bound to the cards, all the heinous creatures representing the cards, came to life and killed the Count and his friends.

The cards were passed around over the years and people used them to play and then die.

Haley, realizing they need to find the deck, decides to take her friends on another road trip back to the mansion.

On the way, they are contemplating who might be next when they drive on a bridge. The car suddenly slows down and stops. Haley's prediction plays out in the background when she told Madeline about her being a Pisces and something about water under a bridge.

Madeline looks at the window which suddenly fogs up. A Hangman game plays out but doesn't let Madeline guess the letters. It fills in the word RUN. And so Madeline does just that since none of the others even noticed the message.

Her friends call out for her but only Haley manages to get out when the others experience a strange phenomenon. They notice a creature running before the car and then hear the thumping sounds. The car's sensors gets activated and the creature breaks through a window before the others manage to take off too.

Haley keeps screaming for Madeline to stop but she keeps running to nowhere. She should have stayed closer to her friends but she apparently wanted to make sure the creature spotted her clearly.

And of course the Hanged Man creature does exactly that. A noose appears around Madeline's neck and she is pulled up. Haley watches in shock as her friend is pulled up into the darkness.

Grant joins her and consoles her when Madeline is brought down again, obviously dead. She is then pulled up again. Does the creature also eat her?

Again, this kill happens off screen so in case you thought you could finally be creeped out, the creatures pull their victims into the dark so the sensitive viewer is spared any gory scenes.

We barely even get to see the creatures properly. It is as if the director is taking great pains to hide the CGI effects.

Anyway, Paxton decides he has had enough adventures for the night and heads back to his campus so that his creature can come for him.

Paxton is in the elevator when it keeps opening to show the Fool creature dancing about. It also keeps opening to the same floor. At one point the jester is walking on the ceiling.

Eventually it does the "lunge at the victim" bit. Since we don't see Paxton laying dead, he obviously survived, right?

The three remaining friends head to the mansion, find the deck and throw it into the fireplace. But uh-oh, it doesn't burn.

Haley decides to call Alma. Alma appears in a leather jacket and all, ready to take down a demon.

But she has no crossbow. She has gems instead, that correspond to the sun signs. She decides to beckon the spirit from the deck. The astrologer appears and plays around with the cards before forcefully doing Alma's reading. Alma's cards is the six of swords.

The poor old woman who had cheated death before, is killed by the astrologer. Again, she is dragged into the darkness and then thrown out with the swords already on her back. Since we don't see the face, there is no confirmation that it is her.

The three do some running around with Paige eventually getting separated. She ends up in a room where there is a stage. A Magician is performing, the very one from her reading. He gets Paige into a box and starts sawing her in half. The audience members have fixed creepy grins on their faces. Again, this scene could have been frightening but somehow the focus is Paige being in a box and screaming for help rather than showing is clearly what she is frightened of.

So yes, she gets sawed in half and luckily we don't get to see Paige actually sawed up. It would have required too much makeup and effects.

Haley and Grant are upstairs, listening to the screams and doing nothing.

TAROT Ending Explained

The two take this time to discuss their failed relationship rather than mourn their friends or think of a way out.

Haley tells Grant how the cards told her their relationship would not work.

Grant makes a comment about being cursed from the start which gives Haley an idea. She decides to do the Astrologer's reading so that she can be cursed by her own curse.

But before that, Grant is pulled out of the window by his creature, the devil, and Haley is haunted by hers.

There's more running about. The creature has Haley in a chokehold when Grant appears like a hero and  saves her. Haley gets the cards and does a reading for the Astrologer.

All the cards come reversed and Haley tells the astrologer that she is in a lot of pain and can't let go. She takes out the death card for the Astrologer and tells her that while it suggests new beginnings, in her case it only means death.

The astrologer is pissed off at her and tries to elevate Haley but eventually, she lets go of the pain of losing her daughter and releases herself from this world.

Grant and Haley walk away from the mansion and sees a car approaching them. They fear it is another creature but it is only Paxton.

See? He survived. We know this already because we didn't see his death now did we?

He explains that his roommate Todd came at the right moment and since the creatures have a thing of killing in front of someone else, he was let go.

The astrologer was just vanquished so it is unlikely that this is the reason Paxton was spared. Why have all the creatures relentlessly stalked and killed others while letting Paxton go. He was alone in the car, was he not?

It was the perfect opportunity to get him.

Anyway, he asks about Paige, barely feels sad that she didn't make it, and gets in the car.

Grant is filled with hope and thinks fate can be changed. Haley is more than done with fate and whatnot.

The movie ends. Finally.

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