10 Recent Horror Movies That Had No Right To Be This Good

9. Immaculate

Immaculate 2024
Neon

The whole "young nun gets preyed upon by a diabolic conspiracy" shtick feels so damn overdone these days that few had high hopes for Immaculate, and it didn't help that Sydney Sweeney seemed fundamentally miscast as a naive novice who gets in way over her head.

When the first trailer for Immaculate dropped, many remarked that they simply couldn't take Sweeney seriously as a nun, that the whole getup was more reminiscent of an SNL skit than a straight-laced horror flick.

But Sweeney absolutely worked hard to dispel this notion, her somewhat aloof acting style actually making her a perfect choice to portray a young woman who finds herself slowly realising she's at ground zero for a grim plot to birth a new messiah.

Sweeney's physically gruelling, wholly committed performance combines with taut direction from Michael Mohan to ensure Immaculate isn't merely a disposable slice of "nunsploitation," but a captivating body horror riff topped by one of the most unforgettable endings to any horror flick from the past year.

 
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Stay at home dad who spends as much time teaching his kids the merits of Martin Scorsese as possible (against the missus' wishes). General video game, TV and film nut. Occasional sports fan. Full time loon.