The Faith of Anna Waters (I) (2016) User Reviews

This turned out to be a dud

[subxerogravity · 4/10 · 11 May 2016]

One of the worse ghost stories that I have seen in recent years. I was not scared at all.

The filmmakers did a lackluster job with the film. It had a lot to it. A woman comes to Singapore to find out why her sister took her life and finds clues that something supernatural was involved. Not a hard story to follow, but then they added in this extra story about a group of priest looking into someone using computers to recreate the tower of Babel, The stories interconnected real badly and I could not tell you how the filmmakers drop the ball with what could have been a touch down.

It's not scary and it does not give me goosebumps or creeps me out. It falls too flat to be any worth watching.

I have a lot of questions

[bouncingflamingo · 5/10 · 22 May 2016]

The actors seem too calm and composed in the face of paranormal entities, *spoiler alert* their first reaction was to bring the victims to the hospital rather then acknowledge the presence of the 'creature'. Not really sure if adding binary code into the mix was just to complex things up or make the film seem more 'codey' or 'puzzle crackling', also where did the list of names that auto-deletes come from? Actually, i realized i have no idea what the tower thing was about. Also, the script for the ex-husband of Anna Waters was really annoyingly frustrating during the part where he was trying to get his daughter out from the house, his hysterical daughter was so bent on staying put in the house but all he could manage was to continuously order her out without any form of rational reasoning except to aggravate her even more by telling her her mother isn't coming back. But the aerial shots in the beginning of the movie was beautiful, the cinematography was quite well done too, also, another white elephant i have to address is why did Anna's ex-husband tried to hang himself after seeing the video clip of a Chinese woman gorging her heart out and seem to have healed in the next clip? Isn't that suppose to be a red flag for him considering how others have committed suicide over that same video they have seen? Like, that is the bloody reason why people are killing themselves, over a Nigerian-prince-million-dollar type paranormal 'scam'. Why would he fall for something that has evidently killed others before him that have not come back to life?

not magnific,but neither awful

[dreamerspub · 5/10 · 1 June 2017]

The movie was decent, OK there are 1-2 bad scenes like in the beginning of the movie, but roughly the movie was nice It has pretty decent horror scenes, and interesting content. But the exorcist scenes were absolutely awful in all ways,with a bizarre acoustic and stupid text.

The movie it's underrated, because of the dumb trailer in my opinion deserves 5/10 points,its not a masterpiece but you won't waste your time watching it :D

Literally Frustratingly Terrible

[papajay224 · 1/10 · 27 July 2016]

I found myself imitating mystery science theater to keep myself full pulling out my hair and gouging out my eyes. The acting is purely Awful! The little girl thinks EVERY disturbance is her mom coming back, the word Mommy is used in this film more than anything else. The plot is terrible, had zero to do with Babel and the tower. Did I mention the offering is nothing? This is nothing more than a B exorcist movie with no plot and terrible acting, even the Asian Priest has miracle ability to hack cyber attacks..... Really? The Tower of Babel is pointless, there is NO offering, I literally would have been pleased had EVERYONE died in this movie. Save yourself the shame and don't watch this terrible film, it isn't even humorous in its terrible nature. If I had control I would delete this video from all things.

I don't know where to start......

[The_Goldfinch · 1/10 · 12 February 2016]

I really don't know where to start......This shouldn't be called a movie at all. The acting is awful and the story is inconsistent and contains many discrepancies. The actors don't seem to fear anything, they keep seeing ghosts and they don't scream, run or even panic. The little girl in the movie doesn't even look like her parents (And no, she is not adopted), I mean, no one noticed that! Not even the cameraman!! The movie is not on a very low budget as you will see that the producers spent a couple of hundred dollars on some graphics for lousy ghosts and flying bodies. I wouldn't really recommend anyone to watch it, not even when you have nothing else to do. You will basically waste 2 hours of your life.

Quote from movie "Doesn't pain remind you of life?" Then this movie is life. A lot of life. Lifeful to watch

[ammtracer · 1/10 · 24 August 2020]

How did they find a 35 year short man to play a 10 year old girl? 3 of the main actors in this movie must be closely related to the person who put up the money to have this film made. How else could they have gotten the part? Was driftwood not available on the beach the day of casting? Spoiler: When they say "doesn't the pain remind you of life"? Why did they have to wrestle her/it to the ground and yank on the feeding tube? Why not just grab a 2x4 piece of lumber and hit her in the face? A. Pain would have reminded her and B. Would have been why more interesting. ~A

Pure and utter nonsensical bullsh*t!

[daniellamorley · 1/10 · 8 January 2017]

Before beginning my review I'd like to state that I went to the extent of creating an account just to comment on how terrible this "movie" is.

Midway through watching, I decided to research the director and script writer (same person not surprisingly) in search of some sort of justification for the poor script writing and directing displayed in the film. The following stumbled me: 1) This is evidently not a low budget film which leads one to question "why is this film so horrible?" And "Who funded this crap and why???!" 2) The actors seem relatively talented, why did they agree to act in this film? 3) What is going on??

As a film student, I find myself genuinely disturbed by the inconsistency and lack of creativity depicted and honestly I could have put together a far better script. If anything this film is humorous... I must give them that, it's gripping. I found myself fixated, awaiting the next corny jump scare. This could genuinely be mistaken for comedy, I mean the demon sounds like Yoda..

F*ck this, I've lost hope in filmmaking.

Pure Pile of Shi*

[hellmakerz · 1/10 · 15 October 2016]

This got to be one the worst Horror Movies i have ever seen. Terrbile acting, Terrible Directing and a REAL TERRIBLE Plot!What's wrong with that grown ass teenager girl that acts as if she was five years old! Mommy Mommy MOMMY!!And the main protagonist have no feelings whatsoever!Ghosts were more scared of them i swear!!And Oh Please, A priest who is into hacking and such!and where the hell is the offering as the name of the dumb movie implies?! they just offered my precious time to the Devi X(! Please PLEASE don't watch this unless you Feel like wasting 90M out of your life ! Trust me on this If you got 90M to Spare just go out there and watch an Ant colony doing their business, or simply stare at the blank white wall and you will be more satisfied than watching this Dumb Stupid Movie.

Mommy is coming back.

[nogodnomasters · 5/10 · 16 October 2017]

Jamie (Elizabeth Rice) travels to Singapore to "investigate" her sister's death (Rayann Condy). Not too much to investigate, she left her PC camera on as she placed a plastic bag over her head. Case close. Blame the ex-husband (Matthew Settle) kidnap the niece Katie (Adina Herz) go back to Chicago and then the ex can hire Liam Neeson to go find his daughter. Set a few guys on fire and you got yourself a film. Nope. She hangs around and discovers that other people are killing themselves, their house is haunted, the ex-is really a nice guy and all the main characters all have some disease/condition.

The computer binary language is universal and this creates a new tower of Babel, but we still need the old one and an exorcism and an anagram. And how did Jamie get home so fast when Katie was in trouble. That was like across town in 2 seconds as if Singapore has no traffic.

This film is being renamed "The Faith of Anna Waters" perhaps to avoid confusion with other films of that title. The acting was not convincing. Adina Herz was not a good fit for the role.

Now the good news. There was no swearing sex or nudity in the film. Now if I had a young girl I would let her/her friends watch this film while I quietly would place a picture of the Tower of Babel in her closet. Sorry, that's how our family rolls.

This is an Indonesian amateur project!!!

[First_Name_Last_Name · 17 May 2016]

The Offering is one of the worst horror movies I have seen in 2016. This one isn't as low budget as many of the crappy ones I have seen this year, but it sure takes the prize on being half-finished and sloppy. It is, in all fairness, also sort of an amateurish Indonesian production.

Even though it doesn't exactly look cheap, the entire project is, from a technical standpoint, utterly terrible. The cinematography and camera work is quite decent for the most part, but the acting, direction, plot and "scary" parts are dreadful. The horror part seems like a badly filmed spoof (the lighting is bad and the shots are often badly executed). The reactions of the characters are also incredibly unbelievable (no details given, since it is spoiler material). And the plot, oh my god. It was so amateurish... Like a bunch of children sat down and listed a plot that they thought was clever, while it was really just incredibly lame.I will not spoil the disappointment for you. Let me just say that I hated everything about it.

I give it two out of ten. I feel this is the right grade.

Nifty supernatural horror shocker

[Woodyanders · 8/10 · 27 April 2021]

Reporter Jamie Waters (a solid and appealing portrayal by Elizabeth Rice) goes to Singapore to uncover the truth about the mysterious circumstances pertaining to the suicide death of her sister. During said investigation Jamie runs afoul of a lethal and powerful demonic entity that's using modern technology to complete an ancient mission.

Writer/director Kelvin Wong relates the engrossing story at a constant pace, makes nice use of the exotic locations, takes time to develop the characters, ably crafts a creepy and unsettling atmosphere, and smartly explores the strong central themes of love, faith, and sacrifice. The sound acting by the capable cast keeps this movie humming: Matthew Settle as flawed, but decent deadbeat dad and father Sam Harris, Adina Herz as sweet little girl Katie, Adrian Pang as the eager Father Matthew Goh, Jaymee Ong as perky babysitter Marjorie Tan, and Colin Borgonon as the sage Father De Silva. A neat little fright film.

The Faith of Anna Waters aka The Offering

[dogma-53668 · 7/10 · 14 March 2019]

Seriously, this isn't a bad movie at all. Not sure what people were expecting but it's got a few good effects and decent acting. Plot is decent enough for the genre. Basically, it's not low, low budget fair. It's definitely worth a view if only for the occasional jump scares. I found it intriguing in some points of the script. And the direction is fluid.

Read One Review, You've Read Them All

[soulcrisis28 · 1/10 · 29 August 2020]

Everyone pretty much had the same outcome with this movie. It's pretty awful. The story is terrible and doesn't connect, the acting isn't so much bad, but bland, therfore adding more boredom to a "scary" movie that isn't scary to begin with unfortunately. So I'm just gonna gripe about what I came here to gripe about... that dang little girl. OMG talk about prime example of a butterball face. Not to mention she's annoying as she is stupid in this movie. EVERY and I mean EVERY little creak or moan or well any noise for that matter that she hears she thinks it's the ghost of her "mommy" coming back. It's so annoying you just wanna punch her through the TV. Hell, you could play a drinking game with as many times as she says "mommy" I promise no one is making it out sober. So she's already got all these strikes working against her and on top of it all, the movie is terrible lol. Skip it if you value your time, if you're like me with too much time, then give it a go, at least time will get killed.

A few jump scares and terrible acting

[saraschrck · 1/10 · 9 June 2018]

Is it just me or does it seem like every one in this film is so underwhelmed by death? The main character finds a man stabbing is own eyes out with his bare hands and seconds after she is 100% calm and gets completely distracted by a text message. This happened again when the father and daughter dug up the skulls. He had just found a demon in the basement and was frantic to leave and get his daughter to safety but seconds after walking into the woods is calm and completely forgets what he was doing when he finds her kneeling in the middle of the forest. No, we didn't need to see the mom and sons skills, we got that they died, it suerved no purpose to show that scene. THERE IS A DEMON IN THE BASEMENT DUDE. FRICKEN RUN. Basically anytime anyone sees something paranormal it's met with at most a gasp and then a shrug. I mean come on! Could we get a little more reaction from these people? I want to genuinely be scared when I watch a movie and so the characters need to be scared. I was also extremely confused why they tied in the scuba suit. It seemed to play no role in any of the story lines and was so utterly pointless and made an already pretty terrible movie worse.

Awful Movie

[alezey-27516 · 1/10 · 27 February 2017]

It is unbelievable how bad this movie is. It is Literally the first time i watch a movie, and couldn't wait for it to end as soon as possible.

Starting with how bad the little girl's acting was. I mean, you would think that she would learn from other young actors on how to act, but not this one, she was awful all the way from start to end.

Then comes the Asian actors, they were so amateur in their acting, and sometimes even not trying!!.

I really miss the old days when horror movies made me come out of the theatre thinking Holy Crap, will I be able to sleep tonight!!!.

Conclusion: Don't waste your time watching this, Seriously.

This movie was abysmal...

[paul_haakonsen · 2/10 · 2 August 2019]

Right, well I watched this movie and it bore the title "The Faith of Anna Waters", but apparently it is really known as "The Offering"? Or so it would seem.

Well, regardless of the title, then this movie was rubbish. Pure and simple. It was uneventful, it was boring and it just lacked appeal and it was frightfully devoid of anything even remotely scary.

It was as it director and writer Kelvin Tong was following a dummy's guidebook of how-to-make-a-horror-movie. But he took it one step further, because everything that was supposed to be scary in the movie just turned out to be cheesy, campy and downright stupid.

I endured a horribly long hour of watching "The Offering", then I just had my share of stupidity on the screen. And I got up and turned it off, never to return to finish the rest of the movie. Why? Well, because the movie was so mundane, so generic, so pointless that it would be a waste of time and effort to return to watch the rest of it. It was a wonder in itself that I managed to sit through a whole hour of this ordeal. But I was hoping that director Kelvin Tong would swing a magical wand and make it all miraculously more interesting.

That just never happened.

The storyline told in "The Offering" was simplistic and easy to follow. Actually, it was so simplistic that it was sort of an insult to the audience, because we were served everything hand and foot, and it was presented in a manner so you didn't have to use your brain in any way. You just sat there, being spoon-fed the contents of the movie. A vile stew of generic storytelling made unwatchable.

The acting in the movie was fairly adequate, although the actors and actresses were indeed fighting a losing uphill battle against an atrocious storyline, a dreadfully boring script, and it didn't help that they were given shallow and pointless characters to portray on the screen and attempt to make interesting for the audience.

If you enjoy horror movies, you need to take heed and do yourself a favor and stay well clear of "The Offering".

A non-recommendable offering

[TheLittleSongbird · 1/10 · 7 May 2018]

Saw 'The Faith of Anna Waters' being fond of horror/thriller regardless of budget (even if not my favourite genre) and being intrigued somewhat by the idea. Being behind on my film watching and reviewing, with a long to watch and review list that keeps getting longer, it took me a while to get round to watching and reviewing.

Unfortunately, despite not reading any reviews purposefully before watching, am going to have to agree with all the reviewers who hated 'The Faith of Anna Waters'. A film that never took off, further ran out of steam very quickly and rapidly got worse by a second half that makes one not want to keep watching. Never judge a film without seeing the whole thing and wanted to give 'The Faith of Anna Waters', so gave it a fair chance.

The location is suitably spooky, which is pretty much the only thing the film has against it.

However, so much brings 'The Faith of Anna Waters' down. The acting is both over-histrionic or disinterested and the direction is so phoned in and pedestrian, one gets the sense that the director showed no interest in the film at all. Too much of the soundtrack is intrusive and annoying, made worse by the excessive and obvious sound effects that just cheapens the mood. The film looks drab generally and like it was made in haste.

Where 'The Faith of Anna Waters' most underwhelms is the writing and story. The writing is incredibly lazy, it's awkward in dialogue, very confused as a result of not tying things up or going into full detail and doesn't feel complete. The story suffers from a very limp pace, apparent early on and gets slower and slower until an interminably dragged out second half. It further suffers from feeling too much like a short film stretched out with a lot of useless padding. The stereotypical characters are both bland and annoying and the inconsistent and illogical motivations bring them down further.

Could not get behind or relate to the overwrought dead sister part of the plot and the whole stuff with the priests was just weird and convoluted badly an otherwise too simple story.

For a film billed as a horror/thriller, there is very little interesting and nothing remotely scary which makes a waste of such a spooky-looking location. Any scares are too few and are far too predictable, anaemic and weakly timed to make impact, with the dull pacing and obvious sound effects cheapening them significantly. 'The Faith of Anna Waters' doesn't engage let alone thrill, and just frustrates constantly in how increasingly dull and ridiculous it is. The ending and most of the feeble attempts at explanation were incredibly vague and like they were made up on the spot.

Summing up, next to nothing to recommend here. 1/10 Bethany Cox

Horrible

[jesspay · 1/10 · 1 December 2021]

This movie convinced me to open up an IMDb and leave a review. I am a huge horror movie buff. I am pretty open minded and can be easily entertained, even if it's not the best movie, but goodness this movie is absolutely HORRIBLE! It is all over the place! So many things did not make sense. I desperately wanted it to end. I wanted to gouge my eyes out! If I could give it a zero I totally would!!!

The Devil is an Irresponsible Influencer

[joshgerlach · 2/10 · 20 November 2022]

This movie is remarkably silly.

It harbors childlike misconceptions of catholicism, which is mostly funny. Apparently the devil concerns himself with DDoS (Direct Denial of Salvation?) attacks on the catholic church of Singapore, specifically, then posts Criss Angel magic trick videos to YouTube telling people to eat Tide Pods to cure their ventricular tachycardia.

The main actress gives a bland, Dollar-Store-Isla-Fisher performance, Matthew Settle settled too much, I've never seen a child actor give an age-average performance that outshines grown actors before, so that was weird, and all the Singaporean actors seem to be looped by American VAs doing bad British or Australian accents.

This is absolutely a money laundering movie.

This is a weird flick. It's free on Prime. Watch it. It's not good. 2 stars.

Below Average

[gab-67599 · 5/10 · 20 March 2022]

This movie was not horrible but it was not great either. The little girl in this movie could only act when she was being possessed. Everyone else delivered in making this movie interesting. The beginning started off well but then things started being illogical and fake looking. The overall story was something I had trouble with. Add in a computer generated leviathan that needs souls to grow and you have lost not only me but the world as well!

Worked for me

[denisemorris1006 · 10/10 · 2 January 2020]

I love horror/supernatural and this one made me jump a few times. It's very atmospheric and the acting is very good.

Not one that hated it

[trambone-49103 · 6/10 · 19 March 2023]

For the most part I love ghost movies and can never find a good one, it's like trying to find the veal parmigiana hot pocket they just don't make them. My issues come with how they tie the ending up and this one did not let me down. I dig the whole ghost bit and was genuinely scared here and there as I love the slow walk through the dark room with a busted flashlight bit. But unlike a White Castle cheese burger this movie was not exactly the same. The busted flashlight always worked, the cat was not the jump scare preparing me for a real scare the real scare was the scare. Granted I am more like a 6 year old paying attention Barney's goofy voice then the lesson he was promoting so the story line worked for me. It was not oh man that's genius but it was not hey let's run to the dark room and hide. A lot of the cliches were twisted around to make the story a bit more realistic where the dad sees something and says "too bad we can't stay". There were cringe worthy moments but seriously look at your popcorn and wonder we're all the snowcaps are hidden instead of harping on those and this movie was worth the watch. Unless you have a series that is taking all your time. I would so watch this on a recommendation.

Good lord this movie is bad!

[thalassafischer · 4/10 · 19 April 2023]

I enjoyed The Maid (2020) and thought Kelvin Tong directed it. Boy was I wrong. He apparently directed The Maid (2005). Because I'm a Western person, I made the stupid mistake of thinking this film - The Offering - set in Singapore was related to the 2020 Thai film when it was directed by the same person as the 2005 Chinese film. Oops.

ANYWAY, I suffered for my ignorance. The Faith of Anna Waters i.e. The Offering (2016) is an absolutely trite and mediocre Americanized Hollywood film set in Singapore. 90 percent of the characters are white people and everyone speaks American English. The writing is bad, the dialogue is wooden, and the actors portraying the child and the ex-husband characters can't even act.

The only thing that compelled me to continue watching is that I genuinely wanted to know what the heck was going on with the mystery behind the film's events. There are a few genuinely scary, disturbing or gross parts but overall the best thing about the film is the house where most of it takes place. Yeah.

He's Trying To Build The Tower Of Babel With The Internet! ???

[wandernn1-81-683274 · 2/10 · 10 November 2021]

Okay this is another one of those with a changed name on Amazon. -1 Star for the name CHANGE.

The Offering apparently = The Faith Of Anna Waters.

Anyways, this one is a skipper. It's senseless and weak script. 2/10.

Final act is a derivative trainwreck

[Norman_French · 3/10 · 13 April 2024]

I was in the mood for some engaging schlock, but ... "Be careful what you wish for." This film tries to be a bit different, and partially succeeds for a time. But the Exorcist-type ending is really bad; totally derivative and stupid to boot.

The way characters in this film see AMAZING supernatural activity, then just shrug it off ("Ho-Hum") is puzzling; it detracts from the film in every possible way. One has to question the directing (to put it mildly).

Some actors were better than others; the worst ones (like the ex-husband) are nearly wooden. It's unclear how the girl was cast; did she lose a bet?

The binary-code-is-the-one-language-and-therefore-demonic plot makes no sense, especially if you understand computers. Is the binary instruction or data? If instruction, for what processor? If data, what is the format (and context)?

This film was a slightly interesting failure, so I'll give it three (3) stars.