 | MOVIE DETAILS • Name: Conjuring the Genie (aka Devil Djinn) • Year: 2021 • Country: UK • Director: Scott Jeffrey • Main cast: Megan Purvis, Sarah T. Cohen, Ben Reid, Nicola Wright • Runtime: 90 minutes • Production company: Jagged Edge Productions • TRAILER |
Conjuring the Genie (2021), also known as Devil Djinn or Evil Genie, is another movie from the Jagged Edge Productions factory and written, produced, and directed by Scott Jeffrey, the team responsible for this recent avalanche of low-budget horror films including titles like The Bad Nun (2018), Don’t Speak (2020) or Cannibal Troll (2021) [read our review here]. And as it is with its sister productions, Conjuring the Genie (2021) is another take on a classic or mythological creature like a djinn can be, not very original in its global idea but done with love for the genre.
The movie centers on a young woman doing research on urban myths when she and some of her friends find themselves summoning the spirit of the djinn. And the skepticism they feel about the subject turns into excitement when they realize the ugly creature is actually granting their wishes. But, as one of the characters says in the movie, that is too good to be true, and the entity soon reveals its evil intentions: he will trick the group of friends in order to steal their souls.
Despite the low budget and quality of the film, it is not a painful one to watch. Not at all. The hour and a half of running time go is a nice walk thanks to a script that although it won’t outstand for its innovation it is, in fact, well structured. The movie never gets to get tedious, and one could even start to get inside of some of the situations and the characters.
The acting in Conjuring the Genie (2021) is acceptable for a production of this kind. Some of the performers are quite lame, but the set of main actors, with a special mention for the main star Megan Purvis, accomplish with strong credibility with their duties.
Writer, producer and director Scott Jeffrey is releasing this year a big amount of movies, and that is a lot of work that deserves some recognition. But on the other side, we must admit that his directing craft needs some improvement. It is unknown to me how much time and budget the cast and crew had to build a movie like Conjuring the Genie (2021), but after watching the film I couldn’t help to feel like they missed a good chance to see an acceptable film, something that could actually transcend. We all have seen in the theaters and having big distribution a good handful of titles with a way worse story than this one, and even with worse execution. Conjuring the Genie (2021) seems to never have aspired to be anything better than a small product, but it doesn’t mean that it is not worth a watch. I enjoyed it enough.
RATE: 4/10
IMDB URL: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt12060182
