Tarot

A group of twenty-somethings have rented a "literal" mansion (I wish writers would find out what that word means and use it properly!) and are having a few fireside beers outside it whilst subjecting us to their dull relationship issues. Needless to say the gang are a politically correct assemblage that tick just about every box and are frankly all pretty well deserving of what's to come. On that front, the clue's in the title. Exploring the house looking to top up their supply of booze, they find a locked room full of all things occult and that includes an unique set of tarot cards. Rather foolishly, but typically disparagingly, they demand that "Haley" (Harriet Slater) read their fortunes. Next thing they are dropping like flies - all in a manner they gradually realise is akin to the results of the tarot reading. As they gruesomely dwindle, they realise that they are going to need some help and so thanks to Google spook, they find a woman (Olwen Fouéré) who informs them of the bleak history of their toxic tarot and tells them that the cards' destruction might be their only road to salvation. Thing is, can they survive long enough to get back to the house? There's nothing at all original here, sorry. We've seen it loads of times before and the uninteresting dynamic between the characters is even more predictable than the denouement. To be fair, the candle-lit visual effects are quite effective at times, but the acting is pretty dreadful and the whole frat-like presentation left me looking at the clock after half an hour. It's a shame. The whole astrology and mythology surrounding the tarot could have offered us a rich vein to tap into and exploit, but here we simply get a rather lazy and formulaic light-horror enterprise that's really devoid of much imagination. Literally.

Can't have a movie with people of color or women anymore without someone being racist and sexist. That being said, this movie is... well, it's not the worst thing I've seen but that doesn't make it good either. The premise is a group of young adults go playing with tarot cards that don't belong to them and then the tarot cards come to life and start doing the murder because curses and vengeful spirits, also horoscopes and astrology are all the rage again, apparently. There's nothing new or original here and apart from one jump scare that got me, it's quite boring. There's one redeeming thing about this movie - it doesn't sequel-bait. It ends with some comedy and that's it. Thank goodness. I skipped watching The First Omen (2024) after about 25 minutes to watch this. I should've skipped this too and just watched another episode of FBI. Can we get some actual good horror this year?

Aside from the novel pitch for diversity, does anyone really have this many diverse friends?, there's nothing terribly inspiring on offer with Tarot. To be fair Tarot has decently creepy visuals, a few well placed jump scares and tolerable acting. That said, its let down by a lack of originality, combined with an ultimately repetitious horror theme, that plays over and over, quickly becoming stale. In summary, what this film needed most was an injection of at least little originality and diversity of the story telling kind. Suffice to say, its mediocre rating, with me at least, was very much, on the cards....