Although The Conjuring is indeed based on a true story, director James Wan used plenty of creative license to make the story more theatre-friendly. We're used to seeing the 'based on a true story' text at the start of so many horror films, but it's easy to forget the real individuals behind the story.
The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It generally follows the real-life timeline of the story upon which it's based – that of Arne Cheyenne Johnson. It starts on July 18, 1981 with the exorcism of 11-year-old David Glatzel, which Johnson was present at.
"The Conjuring" film series, including both the first and second movies, is inspired by real-life paranormal investigations conducted by Ed and Lorraine Warren, who were real-life paranormal investigators and authors. However, the films take creative liberties and dramatize these cases for cinematic purposes.
Yes, the spin-offs do go off into more fantastical directions, but the titular The Conjuring movies are always based on real cases that the Warrens have in their backlog. The first tackled the story of the Perron family, and The Conjuring 2 adapted the story of the Hodgson family in England.
However, the opening scene takes place at the infamous Amityville house, where Lorraine is drawn into a vision during a seance in which she directly encounters Valak for the first time and witnesses Ed being impaled. In Enfield, Lorraine eventually discovers that Valak has been behind the family's haunting all along.
The True Story of The Conjuring Is Creepier Than the Movie
What happened in the real-life conjuring?
It is the spirit of Bathsheba Sherman that causes all the mayhem in the movie. The real-life Bathsheba Sherman did not die by suicide after sacrificing her son. She died in Burrillville in 1885 at age 73, with her son, Herbert Leander Sherman, living another 18 years, into his 50s.
Fans would be shocked to know that the horrific exorcism scene in The Conjuring was based on a real-life séance conducted by Lorraine Warren in the house to contact the spirits that were terrorizing the Perron family.
1. The Conjuring (2013) The movie that started it all remains the tightest, scariest, and most creative of the bunch. In their cinematic debut, the Warrens investigate a disturbing possession at a remote family home in Rhode Island.
Like the previous two movies in the 'main' series, the threequel is inspired by a real-life event that Ed and Lorraine Warren were involved in. This time, it's not a haunted house, but the trial of Arne Cheyenne Johnson.
The Warrens' story of the doll served as inspiration for the Annabelle doll character depicted in The Conjuring Universe, a film series that includes the following: Annabelle (2014), Annabelle: Creation (2017), and Annabelle Comes Home (2019).
A Certified Fresh rating (a first for director James Wan) helps in securing a sequel, a $300 million worldwide box office haul all but guarantees it – and the Conjuring 2 was almost as scary as the original.
Parents need to know that The Conjuring is a truly scary horror movie that's based on a true story about a haunted house, a demon possession, and an exorcism. It's more frightening than gory; no characters die (except a dog), and not much blood is shown, except during an intense demon-possession scene at the climax.
The movie is loosely based on real life events. Bathsheba Sherman was a real Rhode Islander and the Perron family did live in a house that is located on the original Sherman property.
Plot. In Santa Monica, California, John Form, a doctor, presents his expectant wife Mia with a rare vintage porcelain doll as a gift for their first child to be placed in a collection of dolls in their daughter's nursery.
6. The Conjuring (takes place in 1971) The first Conjuring movie to be released in cinemas (in 2013) was a huge box office hit, director James Wan fashioning a nostalgic riff on classic ghost story conventions as seen in The Haunting (1963), The Amityville Horror (1977) and others.
So it'd be ideal if the movie wasn't based on a real story, but sorry! No such luck—the horror flick is indeed inspired by a handful of true events. If you haven't yet seen The Nun because you cherish your ability to fall sleep, allow me to give you a brief recap.
Rather, the sequel turns its focus to a singular villain, an occultist named Isla, the daughter of Father Kastner. While Ed and Lorraine initially believed David and Arne to be possessed by a demon, they discover that Isla actually cursed them by putting a witch's totem beneath the Glatzel's house.
Sadly, while The Conjuring 3 does feature some undeniably effective jump scares, it is not as creepy as the original. There are plenty of ambitious CGI-assisted glimpses into the world of demons, but fewer sequences that can match the original's haunting "hide and clap" scene.
Parents need to know that It Chapter Two is the follow-up to the hugely successful It (2017); both films are based on Stephen King's novel. This one -- which is more centered on adults than kids -- is very long and less scary than the first, but it's definitely entertaining, with great characters and true teamwork.
Bathsheba Sherman is the main antagonist of the 2013 horror film The Conjuring, which is loosely based on the true story of the Haunting in Harrisville, Rhode Island. She is the evil and demonic specter of an 1800s devil worshipper and witch.
The Perron family endured an extreme haunting, but they all survived. That's what people come away with as overarching memories of the film. But the documentary is a masterwork in terms of delving deeply into the psyche, into the emotions of my family members 50 years on, and how it has had an impact in our lives.
This is the actual home of the Perron Family hauntings. The house was made famous by the Ed and Lorraine Warren case files that became the foundation of the 2013 box office smash hit, The Conjuring. We were haunted then, and we are haunted still.
