WITCHBOARD 2

Paige moves into an apartment on the outskirts, where she hopes to be able to dedicate herself to painting, her passion and profession, without distractions. The woman finds a Ouija board in a closet and, curious, begins to use it. Without much difficulty, Paige manages to get in touch with a spirit that says its name is Susan. After some investigations, Paige discovers that Susan was the previous tenant of the apartment and that she is now unreachable, so she thinks the woman was killed and that her spirit is giving her indications to find her body and discover her murderer. Helped by her ex-boyfriend, a policeman, Paige begins her own personal investigation. After the good success of "Spiritika" and "La notte dei demoni," Kevin Tenney turned to films that today almost no one remembers and that certainly did not replicate the fame of his two most famous titles. Therefore, in 1993, the director sought refuge in safe lands by writing and directing a sequel to his first film: "Spiritika 2 - The Devil's Game." This time, however, the game is not worth the candle, and the quality of "Spiritika 2" is mediocre. Tenney attempts to renew himself by not replicating the previous story and not directly connecting the sequel to the predecessor. Therefore, different characters and a different tone, while the center of the story is a Ouija board and a tormented spirit. In some ways, "Spiritika 2" seems almost a forerunner of modern Asian ghost stories, with a vengeful spirit that kills to attract attention to itself (and perhaps take revenge), with a truth to be discovered, a body to be given proper burial, and a culprit to be punished. For all this, credit must be given to Tenney for finding the right formula to justify a number two, setting everything up as a supernatural mystery, unfortunately, however, the film has a rather unappealing package and a story that still does not manage to captivate as it should. "Spiritika 2" seems almost like a TV movie, it has the rhythm, the somewhat bland aesthetics, and the modesty, and yet it is not. Everything appears contained, both at the narrative and visual level, assimilating this title to so many other modest productions of the '90s that seem to be made to be aired in primetime on our local TVs. Furthermore, a decidedly negative contribution to the film is given by the actors, all at quite high levels of mediocrity, starting with the protagonist Amy Dolenz, a very pretty blonde who has done a lot of TV and appearances in small horrors like "Ticks - Blood Larvae" and "Pumpkinhead II." Even here, as in the previous one, the ease with which people manage to get in touch with spirits is beyond all imagination, but the merit in this case is that the narrative construction of the film plays on the identity of the contacted spirit in a more witty way than in the first film. A mediocre little film, therefore, this "Spiritika 2," certainly watchable to spend an hour and a half of entertainment, but definitely inferior to the previous one and inexplicably undermined by so many limitations.