In the South Korean horror film Dark Nuns, Sister Juniya (Song Hye-Kyo) is a rebellious nun who performs exorcisms despite the odds being against her. Not only that, but she also has uterine cancer that has spread throughout her body, and the demon she is facing knows very clearly that she is destined to die within 6 months. On paper, this sounds like a deep story, but in execution, I think it was a bit lacking.
Dark Nuns follows the exorcism of a young non-believer named Hee-Joon, and begins with the boy being exorcised by a priest who is unable to get rid of the demon. This is when Sister Juniya comes in, saving the day by partially containing the demon, but this is not enough. In this universe, if a priest fails to exorcise someone, that person becomes possessed to show us how powerful these demons really are.
Director: Hyeok-jae Kwon
Writers: Hyo-jin Oh, Kim Woo-Jin
Stars: Song Hye-kyo, Jeon Yeo-been, Lee Jin-wook
Hee-Joon's desperate mother takes him to a hospital run by priests as a last resort. Here, Father Paolo doesn't believe in possessions or exorcisms; no, he thinks Hee-Joon has DID and needs psychiatric treatment. Working under him is a nun named Sister Michaela, who pretends to believe in Father Paolo, but in truth, she has another opinion. Juniya then gets Michaela to join her in saving the boy, but will they manage to do so? We'll find out in Dark Nuns.
In Dark Nuns, both Sister Juniya and Sister Michaela are called "spawns" of demons. Apparently, this means people born from wombs that were possessed. Like a half-demon? It seems that Hee-Joon is such a child as well. It seems that these spawns inherit some powers from demons. Juniya is hard of hearing, but can hear the sound of spirits. Michaela can see visions of the future. The spawn are destined to become shamans or end up dead. A girl Michaela grew up with, possibly her sister, committed suicide after teaching Michaela about tarot. This is why Michaela puts her faith in tarot; this is something that will come into play later in the film. I assume this is why the duo is able to protect Hee-Joon better than any priest.
The priests refuse to give Juniya permission to perform an exorcism because as a nun, she cannot be ordained. This leaves her no choice but to take Hee-Joon through a different kind of exorcism. Furthermore, she performed the exorcism when the previous priest nearly died in the process, but that was unofficial and no one was willing to acknowledge it. Juniya and Michaela take Hee-Joon to a shaman, who, like them, is a spawn of demons but decided to do his duty.
She is so good at what she does that she can tell that Juniya needs to get checked out to see if he has cancer. I guess everyone knows that he is dying soon. Anyway, this ritual doesn’t go as planned. In the shamanic ritual, animals are sacrificed instead of humans after they are forced to house the demons. But in this case, all the animals die on their own. Even the pot of water that the shaman is standing on breaks, making it clear that this demon is too strong for them. So, it seems that the only person who can save Hee-Joon is Juniya herself.
After seeing what happens with the shaman, Michaela freaks out a little and Juniya tells her her real name, calling herself a monster to show her some kind of solidarity. Michaela then does a tarot reading with Juniya. The first card she pulls out is the Hierophant, which is supposed to symbolize religious harmony, tradition, and social compliance. Michaela says that the card can also mean people with spiritual abilities.
The next two cards she pulls out are Death and the Emperor, which she explains by saying that even if the Emperor is dead, the one with spiritual abilities will rise. I guess in this case Juniya and Michaela will defy authority (death of the emperor) to save Hee-Joon. But more importantly, the last card she pulls out is the Lovers, which means unity and completeness.
To me, this seems like a marriage of the old and the new, shamanic ritual and the church, because that's what we'll see pretty soon. Before doing the exorcism, Juniya visits the shaman from before, but he refuses to let anyone help her, claiming that everyone is busy that day because it's an important day for ancestral connections. This leaves Juniya with only one option: invite the stuttering boy (Ae-Dong) to be the shaman at the place. Ae-Dong is actually the reason why Hee-Joon didn't jump into the ocean to kill himself before the previous ritual.
Gamigin is the demon that has possessed Hee-Joon, and is one of the 12 evil spirits that we keep hearing about in this movie and the previous one called The Priests.
During the ending of Dark Nuns, after learning the demon’s name, Juniya takes him to her cancerous womb. Before, the demon had mentioned that she was a barren woman, so is it possible that Juniya wanted to have children but became a nun because of her cancer? It seems that Juniya is willing to sacrifice herself, as a woman and as a potential mother, to save the child, even though the priests told her that she should focus on getting rid of the evil spirits, even if it means killing the child.
I think that if there was a priest in Juniya’s place, he would have died or, worse, been possessed. But, just as the demon predicted, Juniya dies a painful death in hellfire after the entire building they do the ritual in burns down. She tells Michaela and Ae-Dong to take Hee-Joon to the nearest church and ring the bell 3 times so that he can hear. This is so that she knows that the child is safe and she can let herself burn in the fire with the demon. Juniya dies in the fire, and we can assume that the demon is sent back to hell as well, through her sacrifice. The sacrifice of a woman for the future of the entire world.
In the ending of Dark Nuns, Deacon Choi shows up at Juniya’s grave. It is then Sister Michaela who leaves with him. She asks him where they are going, and he says wherever the 12 evil spirits are. This implies that there is a possibility of a larger franchise of The Priests. Dark Nuns is a direct sequel to The Priests, and I assume that with the Deacon and the assistant, they have everything they need to save whoever comes next.
In the end, Sister Michaela finally accepts her true nature as someone who can be powerful rather than weak with her abilities. It is Juniya who gives her the strength to believe in herself. It is a shame that he was unable to save her, though. Hee-Joon will make a full recovery and be a normal boy once again.
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