The Queen of Black Magic – Terrifying
Director: Kimo Stamboel
Writer: Joko Anwar (Screenplay)
Starring: Ario Bayu, Hannah Al Rashid, Adhisty Zara, Muzakki Ramdhan, Ari Irham, Ade Firman Hakim
Plot: Families were terrorized at the orphanage. Someone wants them dead, apparently with black magic that is very deadly. She has a grudge and she was also born because of the sins of the orphans who formed her into the Queen of Black Magic.
Runtime: 1 Hour 39 Minutes
There may be spoilers in the rest of the review
Story: The Queen of Black Magic starts when a family Hanif (Bayu), Nadya (Rashid), Dina (Zara), Haqi (Ramdhan) and Sandi (Irham) visit the orphanage where Hanif was raised meeting his best friends from the orphanage Anton (Ginting) and Jefri (Khan) as they come to pay respect to the man that helped raise them as he is seriously ill.
As the families look read to settle for the night, they start to experience terrifying events, which leads to them needing to work together to escape or face the very bleak outcome from the Queen of the Black Magic.
Thoughts on The Queen of Black Magic
Characters & Performances – Hanif is the husband and father that was raised in the orphanage, he is returning to pay his respects, but his journey there sees him involved in a car accident, which looks like it might have been just an animal, it isn’t, it does show him the shocking truth about what has happened in the orphanage, as he looks to save his children and remember what happened when he was younger. Nadya is the wife and mother that is left to fight to save her children after learning the shocking truth from inside the orphanage. We do get to meet the rest of their family with their youngest Haqi being involved in the biggest scare sequence, the other former orphans, as well as the Queen of Black Magic, that has been waiting for her chance to come back for people. The performances through the film are great, with the family feeling nature, while the reactions to the scares add fear.
Story – The story here follows a family returning to an orphanage to pay respect to the man that raised one of them, meeting up with old friends before learning the orphanage is going to come back to haunt them, when we learn the truth about what happened here before. This is a story which will dive into the ghostly moments as we see a group of people being haunting by the past, which will see them getting different shocking moments with the spirit, each one leading up to the truth about what has caused them to return. We get a nice pace, which will give us a chance to meet everyone involved, before the scares start up, which will see the events mean something to what is happening. This story will get everything it deserves out of it, which will leave you both terrified and shocked along the way.
Themes – The Queen of Black Magic is a horror that will give us plenty of scares, with spine tingling moments, which includes a young boy watching television, being the true highlight of fear in this film. Nearly the whole film is set in the orphanage, which is away from rescue, meaning the people are alone trying to escape the horror, we get some brilliant special effects, which are saved for later in the film, but give us an effected addition twist on what we would expect.
The Queen of Black Magic is an exceptionally scary horror film that will leave you quivering in fear.