The Old Ways
The most important thing one can do is be honest with their family. Even if that means acknowledging some hard truths about oneself. In “The Old Ways,” Christina makes out as if she is just here for an investigative piece on sorcery and healing magic in her homeland of Veracruz, but she also is carrying with her a secret that, if held on too long, could jeopardize her future. On the surface, “The Old Ways” is all about supernatural horror. Looking further, it is about rediscovering yourself when you make your way home.
Christina (Brigitte Kali Canales) is haunted by memories of an event that happened with her mother when she was a child. That is part of what draws her back to Veracruz when an opportunity opens up to explore sorcery and healing. She goes searching in old ruins and in the jungle, but then finds herself chained up in a shack, and told she has a demon infecting her. Miranda (Andrea Cortés) is a local who remembers Christina, and is the interpreter for her with Javi (Sal Lopez), and old man helping Luz (Julia Vera), the shaman who helped with her mother. Will the non-believer come to believe in what she’s being told?
The screenplay by Marcos Gabriel understands that, in addition to the horror elements of the story, a psychological aspect need to be part of the equation, and there are things we see in private with Christina that give us hints about her mental state. Canales is very good in the role, and is game for what she is put through in this role in the same way Bruce Campbell was in the “Evil Dead” movies and Alison Lohman was in “Drag Me to Hell.” This isn’t to say that director Christopher Alender is simply aping Sam Raimi, though there are certainly parts in the second half of the film, when the supernatural aspects come to play, that feel like those films in their energy and imagination. First and foremost, however, “The Old Ways” is a possession/exorcism thriller, and the closed room aspect of it is successful, we get on board with the characters very early on, and the setting and narrative thrust help bring it home. “The Old Ways” are worth discovering, and embracing, in this film.
