Director and co-writer Christopher Smith grabs the audience's attention immediately in the opening scene of Consecration, as a nun crosses a busy London street and points a pistol directly at Grace (Jena Malone). Why is this seemingly holy woman determined to commit murder in broad daylight? The answers to that enticing question aren't entirely satisfying, but Consecration maintains its creepy atmosphere even through its muddled plot.
Following that opening scene, Consecration flashes back to Grace's seemingly mundane life, working as an optometrist and living alone in a London flat. There's something eerie attached to her, though, and she experiences flickering lights and ominous noises in her apartment before she gets a phone call that her estranged brother Michael (Steffan Cennydd), a Catholic priest, has died. He was involved in an alleged murder-suicide at a convent in coastal Scotland, where he was visiting with another priest. The nuns at the convent claim that Michael killed his fellow priest, then killed himself by jumping off a seaside cliff.
Grace doesn't believe that her brother would do those things, and she travels to the convent to get answers. She soon starts having disturbing visions and unexplained blackouts related to secrets from her past that hold the key to what happened with Michael. The nuns are alternately menacing and welcoming, letting her stay in her brother's room but also implying that she may not be allowed to leave. The local police detective assigned to the case, DCI Harris (Thoren Ferguson), tells Grace that technically, the convent's land is sovereign Vatican territory, and the Vatican sends its own representative, Father Romero (Danny Huston), to investigate.
It's no coincidence that Father Romero is named after a famous horror filmmaker, and the church has plans for Grace, even if she doesn't understand why they're after her. Smith employs periodic flashbacks to fill in the gaps in Grace's backstory, but it takes a while for Consecration's plot to come together. In the meantime, Consecration is moody and slow in a way that can feel frustrating. It doesn't have many outright scary moments. Smith gets a lot of mileage out of the inherent creepiness of nuns, especially the intense Mother Superior, imbued with unsettling zealotry by Janet Suzman.
Father Romero presents himself as the more rational, grounded face of the church, but all the religious officials have the same goal in mind. "There is but one God," they keep telling Grace and anyone else who questions them. It sounds more like a threat than a reassurance. Whatever secrets Grace and Michael have kept represent a serious threat to the church, even if Grace isn't aware of what they are.
Smith is still best known for his twisty 2009 sci-fi thriller Triangle, and Consecration plays with similar elements of non-linear storytelling, but it's fairly straightforward once everything is revealed. It's closer to Smith's most recent movie, 2020's The Banishing, a simple, low-key haunted house story starring Downton Abbey's Jessica Brown Findlay. Both movies focus on female characters discovering dark conspiracies related to old buildings in remote locations and sins committed by the church.
Consecration is more pointed in its condemnation of organized religion, but the plot remains a bit too wispy to present a serious critique. Smith mainly uses religion as a jumping-off point, relying on familiar imagery to stand in for more intense scares. Consecration is light on blood and gore. The only real monster it presents is intolerance. That may make it disappointing for some horror fans, but like The Banishing, it succeeds thanks to a strong central performance and a layered protagonist.
Malone gives Grace a mix of defiance and vulnerability, which grow in different ways as memories of her childhood start to return. Huston matches her as the unctuous Father Romero, with Suzman getting all the truly nasty lines and portentous pronouncements. The location, with its imposing cliffs, crashing waves, and crumbling ruins, adds to the sense of danger, as Grace is isolated and overwhelmed as soon as she arrives. Smith bathes the convent's grounds in the requisite fog and offers some startling images, including the haunting sight of the nuns calmly lying face down on the floor as they prepare for a twisted holy ritual.
By the end, the plot still hasn't quite come into focus, and the return to that jarring opening scene is a bit of a disappointment. It's unlikely that viewers will be watching Consecration over and over, scouring it for clues, as some fans have done with Triangle. Still, it's a solid, spooky tale that will fit perfectly beside The Banishing on Shudder when Consecration starts streaming later this year.
Consecration opens Friday, Feb. 10, in theaters nationwide.