THE 100 CANDLES GAME: THE LAST POSSESSION (aka 100 CANDLES II, 2024)

Released in the UK on digital, soon to be released ON Demand in the US from 101 Films!
Directed by Carlos Goitia, Guillermo Lockhart, Andrés Borghi, David Ferino, Ryan Graff, Maximilian Niemann, Jerónimo Rocha, Arie Socorro.
Written by Camilo Zaffora.
Check out the trailer here!!

THE 100 CANDLES GAME: THE LAST POSSESSION opens with “Arcana,” a wonderfully grody scene of a witch, bound with chains, concocting a special spell with whatever vile wickedness that happens to be in her stone cell. Rats and forms of human fluids are used to make this potent spell. It’s gory and quite imaginative, especially the awesome hoof foot she sports. This was a cool start letting the viewer know we are in for a gnarly good time.

We then shift to Stonewall Mansion as a group of urban explorer influencers gather to play the 100 Candles Game, where each candle represents a scary tale from each of the participants. This proved to be a good enough wraparound to tie all of these random tales together in the first one, and does so again with this sequel.

David Ferino’s “Origami” is a quickie that ends in a cool special effects punchline about a babysitter who does that origami star game with the kid she babysits. It kind of goes by too fast to really form an opinion about it, other than the last effect is good and gory.

“Five Minutes” from Maximilian Niemann is about a man locked in a room with something outside and a gun to his head is the way the next story begins. Turns out it’s a zombie apocalypse and the man has his daughter locked in the next room and a wound on his arm. Is he infected? That’s what he’s trying to determine in this intense and tension laden short. This one has marvelous cinematography with some wicked zooms, pans, and slo mos.

Jorge Bano’s “Let Her Go” is another one that begins in a locked room. A bride is having a panic attack on her wedding night. The phones rings non-stop and the husband paces outside frustrated. It’s a suspenseful situation that culminates quite quicky with a glorious shockeroo end. I really dug this one.

We move quickly to the next one “Behind the Door” by Andrés Borghi about a woman attempting to contact her dead father via a ritual to find out where he left his money. I loved the pacing of this one and it went by way too quickly, bur it has one of the most potent scares of the entire movie.

Next is an intriguing set-up with a disappointing end. Things are left way too ambiguous in Ryan Graff’s “The Black Moon” with this story of a woman who hears a noise coming from what seems to be a weeping woman in a tunnel. When she goes to look, she falls into a nightmare. We aren’t given exactly what the woman sees, which makes the whole admittedly scary lead up feel hollow.

The problem with all of these short tales is that they start and finish in very little time, leaving me with wanting more story from each tale to flesh out characters, the monsters, and the world they all inhabit. Most of these tales just came and went so fast, it’s hard to recall all of them unless, like me, you take notes for a review. Each tale was quite shocking in their own way. All of them looked great with some really vivid cinematography and some nightmarish creatures. And the acting with solid all the way through. I just wish there were more meat on the bones of the stories in this anthology. The hour and ten-minute runtime could have been padded with more drama, horror, and atmosphere, but instead this installment felt like it needed to be in and out fast. Though the title promises to be the last possession in this 100 Candles Game, the ending promises more, which I’d be game to as this was a strong, albeit short anthology.