In short: Asih (2018)

1980. Eight-months pregnant Puspita (Citra Kirana), her husband Andi (Darius Sinathrya) and Andi’s mother (Marini) have moved to the country. Alas, the house belongs to the territory of the kuntinalak Asih (Shareefa Daanish), of future Danur fame, and we all know that Asih has a bit of a thing about children, even the not yet born. So the young couple is going to have to cope with some rather hefty supernatural troubles that won’t simply be resolved with the proper disposal of a placenta (though they will try that).

There’s really no reason why the Conjuring movies should have all the fun with spin-off prequels about some of their ghosts and ghoulies, particularly when the Danur-movies, from which this spins off, seem to have commercial clout in their native Indonesia comparable to the US advertorials for a couple of horrible charlatans.

Not looking at the commercial side of the business, I’m not sure the world exactly needed Awi Suryadi’s prequel to its universe’s mainline films. The Danur movies (as directed by Suryadi) themselves aren’t always the deepest horror movies, but they are consistently fun and interesting, sometimes even inventive. The first Asih isn’t quite so good. From time to time, Suryadi manages to find his usual flair for mood-building and the ability to turn clichés into a fun set-piece or two, but at least half of this not exactly long movie feels a bit too much like a creative team dragging their feet. There really isn’t enough material on screen to make for a full movie, and nothing we learn about our titular kuntilanak’s backstory changes all that much about what we know from the first Danur, making much of the film at hand simply feel rather too slight for comfort, particularly since it shows little interest in doing much with the more interesting elements about our victim family.