The Haunting of La Llorona

Well, I must admit that the 2019 movie "The Curse of La Llorona" was interesting, and when I happened to stumble upon another 2019 movie of a similar title, "The Haunting of La Llorona", of course I was intrigued.

So I picked up a copy of the 2017 movie from writer Geno McGahee and director Dennis Devine. I hadn't heard about the movie prior to now in 2021 when I had the opportunity to sit down and watch it.

But with it being a horror movie that I hadn't already seen and a fairly interesting movie cover, of course I gave "The Haunting of La Llorona" a chance.

Turns out that I was not in for a particularly great horror movie. This didn't even feel like a horror movie made for TV, it was just beyond that in the sense that it was by no means scary, and the special effects in the movie were dubious and questionable at best. Initially, I would have assumed this could have been another mockbuster by The Asylum, but it wasn't even at that level.

The storyline was fairly straight forward, though it was mundane and boring. Nothing much of any great interest happened throughout the course of the movie as the storyline trotted on.

The acting in "The Haunting of La Llorona" was actually fair enough, though the actors and actresses had precious little to work with here in terms of a proper script and characters. And that was something that reflected poorly on the movie.

If you enjoy a proper horror movie, then you might as well skip on "The Haunting of La Llorona" entirely, because it simply isn't really worth the time, money or effort. It feels like an amateurish low budget horror flick at best.

My rating of the 2019 lands on a mere three out of ten stars.

Sure this isn't another low budget Canadian movie?

One of the lowest budgeted movies I've ever seen. I strive to watch as many horror flicks as possible because I have a love for them, but I wish I hadn't found this. I mistook it for The Curse of La Llrorona and figured I would go with it anyway. Terrible acting, horrible effects, bad audio, god awful lighting... I hate to hate on it so much, but it really was awful.

I'm so sorry for this, I usually try to find something positive in all movies, even in the bad ones, because I try to appriciate the hard work of those who made it. But this is a movie I don't see that now. I only see a school project here, and even from the worst category. The story is lame, the acting is horrible with a horribly written script,i don't even see the touch of a make up artist, and where were a professional camera man during the shooting? The camera is shaking so many times if it would made with a phone..and i could continue. It should be a movie and not a school project. I just regret that one hour i ruined from my life to watch it. By the way, the poster is good, it is a shame that there is nothing to do with the movie. Who is the lady in the picture, because I didn't see her in my screen.. (maybe she is not a demon,but a ghost? 🤔 Dam,dam,daam.)

"The Haunting of La Llorona" is an example of a 'mockbuster'. If you don't know what a mockbuster is, it's a film with a title almost exactly like a big film that is expected to debut soon. In other words, a small-time film company with very tiny budgets hear about a Disney or Fox film that is coming out in a year or so. And, they quickly create a movie with nearly the same title and posters that look like the big-name film in an attempt to fool suckers into believing their pathetic film is, in fact, the big budgeted Hollywood film. They do this by making and releasing their films QUICKLY....usually just before the A-level film debuts. It's dishonest and essentially hopes to piggyback on the money the big studio spends on publicity. And, most every one of these mockbusters I've seen have been simply god-awful.

"The Haunting of La Llorona" is a film hoping to capitalize on the upcoming picture, "The Curse of La Llorona". In fact, the films are so close I noticed that one review was posted on the wrong IMDB page. I don't blame the reviewer...such a mix-up isn't surprising. After all, the folks who made "The Haunting of La Llorona" were hoping such a mix-up would occur!

The story is supposed to be based on the Mexican folk tale of La Llorona. The story is similar to the Greek story of Medea...very similar. When a woman learns that her husband has been cheating on her, she kills her children and then herself. She's called 'La Llorona' because this woman is cursed to wander the earth....wailing (hence the word 'Llorona'). But in the film, she doesn't cry but instead appears and disappears just to kill people...laughing all the while. Apparently, the writer of the story hadn't bothered to learn about the folk tale...which is both sloppy and disrespectful.

So what does the film have to offer? In other words, is there anything good about this mockbuster? No. Nope. Nada. The acting is amateurish, the camera work very choppy and sloppy, the music is VERY bad (loud, inappropriate and with some abrupt edits), and the script, as I mentioned above, isn't the story of La Llorona at all. The direction is bad....such as when folks reach into the refrigerator and bull out already opened cans of beer! Who keeps can of opened beer in the fridge...multiple cans?! But worst of all is the make-up...which is one of the most important parts of a film because it's a horror movie about ghosts. It just doesn't look professionally done and it appears as if the actors had to apply it themselves...in the dark. A very bad film...even by mockbuster standards!

If you want to watch it, which I'd only recommend you do if you want a good laugh, it's available on Amazon Prime...which I watched on my Roku.