10 Movies That Explained Way Too Much

The Ritual is a really effective horror film that you should watch. The over explanation on display here is not as damaging as the kind in Sinister. Even on a conceptual level, learning more about the central monster of the film doesn’t dissipate The Ritual’s scares quite in the way learning about Bughuul dissipates horror in Sinister. Ultimately, the over explaining in this movie is of a simpler kind - instead of explaining the monster or its motives as happened for other monsters I’ve discussed in this list, our explanation is purely visual here. We just see too much of the monster.

The way the monster operates remains fascinating and terrifying. Moreover, as it’s revealed more and more, we can see that its design is actually really cool. But, with this kind of visual explanation of what is at the root of the horror film we’ve been watching, its power seems to diminish a bit. Rather than being some Lovecraftian horror that cannot be completely pinned down hunting down the main characters, we get chases involving the main characters and a well-defined, singular monster.

Much of this could have been helped even just by obscuring the monster more, by withholding that visual explanation from us. By seeing it in the flesh, it loses that terrifying quality that only obscurity can provide.