Stream It Or Skip It: ‘The Influence’ on Netflix, a Ridiculous Spanish Horror Flick About a Vindictive Witch on Her Deathbed

Netflix continues to dish up spooky-season fodder, and Spanish flick The Influence (La Influencia) stirs up spiders and skulls with its brand of neo-gothic witchiness. There’s lots of new creepy content to sift through before Halloween gives way to (gack) The Holidays, so let’s see if The Influence manages to stand out among the pack.

THE INFLUENCE: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: Oh, mama. Alicia (Manuela Velles) is going home after a lengthy estrangement. Her mother, Victoria (Emma Suarez), is comatose, kept alive by a respirator. Alicia’s nursing skills will help relieve some of the caretaking burden from her sister, Sara (Maggie Civantos). So Alicia and hubby Mikel (Alain Hernandez) and 11-year-old daughter Nora (Claudia Placer) move into Mum/Grandma’s house.

So, about this place. It’s where Alicia and Sara grew up. It’s a three-story brick thing isolated in the woods, and it looks like it hasn’t been updated since 1887. Nothing a little paint, some new curtains and an exorcism couldn’t cure! It’s full of taxidermy that needs a good dusting followed by a ritual burning. On the third floor lays Victoria, ashy and in need of a manicurist who’s also a part-time necromancer. A nearby room looks like Guillermo del Toro’s boudoir: jars full of gross unidentifiables, books stuffed with scribbling and pentagrams, skullish things, an antique sewing machine with an autopilot feature, artifacts from the gift shop at Satan’s Museum of Unnatural History, etc. Young Nora pokes around in there, finds a nifty spider locket and pockets it. Uh oh.

Victoria’s a witch, see, and flashbacks tease the disturbing stuff she did to her daughters a decade or three ago — hence, Alicia’s damage. Meanwhile, in school, Nora is the new kid and object of cruelty; she looks outside and sees a grubby moppet named Luna (Daniela Rubio) watching, and also keying the living crap out of some cars. The few remaining family members gather for a reading of the living will, only to learn that Nora is the sole heir. Soon enough, Nora becomes extra surly, uncharacteristically pummels her bully about the face until she bleeds a lot and starts hanging out with Luna, who wants Nora to join her for much more than just committing light-to-middling vandalism.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: I assume The Influence is titled The Influence because Hereditary was taken already. Not that it’s a direct ripoff; it also stirs in elements of any of dozens of creepy-kid movies (The Omen, Children of the Corn, etc.), as well as Spanish goth-horror stuff like The Others and Crimson Peak. It also cops a witchy vibe from Dario Argento’s impeccable occult-femme classic Suspiria.

Performance Worth Watching: I’m calling out art director Oscar Sempere here, because the sets and props are like Spirit Halloween on too many of Ally Sheedy’s Pixy Stix sandwiches.

Memorable Dialogue: “Victoria isn’t going to wake up, Sara,” Alicia says so early in the first act, there’s no way she isn’t speaking too soon.

Sex and Skin: None.

Our Take: From its opening scene, The Influence exhibits the type of self-seriousness foreshadowing our inevitable laughter at its expense. Certainly, that can be entertaining, but this snail’s-pace thriller takes its sweet time establishing some at-best vaguely interesting characters before it finally gets to the macabre histrionics. Director Denis Rovira van Boekholt surely intends to build suspense, but stretching a threadbare plot over some admittedly impressive and detailed set pieces just doesn’t cut it.

The movie manages to conjure some ominous atmosphere with all the mystical paraphernalia and moody lighting. (One joke, intentional or otherwise, I appreciated was how Mikel is an electrician, and one of his jobs is to fix the many non-functional lights in Victoria’s dimly lit House of Dead Animals and Other Abominations.) But its reveals are underwhelming, and it ends with some nonsense and defenestration and our shrugs of indifference.

Our Call: SKIP IT. With so much good horror fodder waiting for your consumption, I can’t recommend this mediocre bit of supernatural jive. Watch In the Tall Grass instead.

Your Call:

John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Read more of his work at johnserbaatlarge.com or follow him on Twitter: @johnserba.

Stream The Influence on Netflix