The thing with a James Wan franchise, as proven by the Insidious films, is he never repeats himself and constantly strives to better each film within the series. Wan has stated that he intends to use the Conjuring 2 with his new label Atomic Monster to bring back big budget studio horror films in the vein of Poltergeist and the Exorcist. He has succeeded with The Conjuring 2 on so many levels.
We once again follow Ed and Lorraine Warren as they investigate a new but culturally familiar case in the town of Amityville. The case has taken quite a toll on Lorraine as she is plagued with premonitions of Ed's death, but also a toll in their credibility as Amityville has been nationally scrutinized as a hoax. Conjunctly in Enfield, England a young girl named Janet who lives with her mother, two brothers and sister, begins being tormented by an unseen force that maliciously rattles the children from their sleep and in some cases physically abuses them. As local media gets wind of the horrors befalling the Hodgson family, the incident of Enfield soon becomes known as England's Amityville which makes the church very wary to investigate the case for fear of it being a hoax as well. The Warrens are dispatched to investigate much to the chagrin of Lorraine who is still plagued by premonitions of Ed's death. The Warrens struggle to prove the Hodgson's are truly being haunted but it also becomes apparent that something sinister is hiding its motives from everyone other than the Hodgson family so it may carry out its evil deeds with ease. 
The opening of the film is the Amityville case which is done so thrillingly within a 10 minute scene that it trumps anything the remake of Amityville ever attempted to do and does it so effortlessly too. This scene reels you into the movie perfectly and sets up the tone for the entire film. This could have easily been a winking gimmick just to show another case but goes so perfectly with the main narrative I don't think the film could work without it. Most famously both Amityville and Enfield in real life were scrutinized for being complete hoaxes and the Warrens themselves lost much accreditation being on so many talk shows as their work became more publicly known and associated with the cases. This aspect is played within the entire film. The characters constantly question the validity of what's in front of them, anything and everything could be fake. This leaves us with a type of cat and mouse narrative unseen in a regular haunting film. The spirit is always hiding from anyone trying to prove its existence yet will throw the most intense forms of spectral visions at the family it haunts. By the end of the film if you question the validity of the Warrens in real life, you are presented with a thought that maybe the spirits themselves wanted you to question the Warrens thereby defeating them publicly. Such a strange but amazing concept.
If you are tired of the promise of terrifying and original looking ghosts in a haunting film, only to get a few things thrown around and a person with the same white makeup as in every movie you are definitely in for a treat! Wan wanted to bring the spectacle back with his horrors and brings a few new creatures that are hauntingly eerie as well as unique. There is one character ghoul in here particularly that may stand out as being remembered on par with the clown from Poltergeist! 
What truly amazed me in this film was the unique simplicity of Wan's camera work. One scene in particular was a two person shot of Patrick Wilson as Ed being the focus of the camera while Janet was out of focus sitting in a chair in the background. Ed is interviewing Janet with his back turned to her as per the spirits request and as he speaks to her she slowly morphs into an aging disturbing looking man. It's so subtle you can almost miss it but once you notice the morph it's truly haunting and this scene is quite long with the camera staying stationary keeping the same focal point. This camera work combined with the acting of Wilson gives us one of the most intense and interesting scenes in a contemporary horror movie. 
The acting is superbly combined with a great script. Each character is given a decent bit of information at appropriate times to balance them all and make you care about them to some degree. The acting is done so well that every scene seems necessary and productive to the narrative. The only time this falters a bit is a scene or two that gives way to comedy but honestly they are so damn funny you don't really care, it's good breather before you're thrust into more horror. The stand out performance though that continues from the first film is Vera Farmiga who plays Lorraine Warren. If you've watched her horror career especially you can see how versatile she is going from Norma Bates insane fits of rage in Bates Motel to Lorraine Warren's calm soothing poise that permeates and welcomes people to her. She also plays perfectly the suppressive struggle of her gift of sight, it's necessary to her work but some things she sees she must keep to herself and bare them alone. The aforementioned opening Amityville scene is intensified by her spectacularly possessed performance. 
The film is amazingly clever from start to finish and even clichéd jump scares that you expect coming may mislead you into even worse terrors. At the center of the terror though is a great family drama from both the Warrens and the Hodgson's whose paths meet under terrifying circumstances. This dynamic is the heart of the film that Wan so perfectly captured in the first one that most contemporary horror films lack. In between the horrors you have moments where you genuinely care for the characters and what happens to them, making it much more terrifying. What could make this film better? It's a period piece and Wan loves to remind you of that with the clothes, technology and especially a well placed song that will give you a giggle before Wan decides to scare the hell out of you. Five out of five Warren files to the hope that we see more opened in future Conjuring films!
