The most fascinating legends are those about vampires or demons from civilizations other than European folklore. Each legendary species deserves its own film, although when Hollywood fails to deliver, we can always depend on independent filmmakers to take a chance and bring these creatures to life on the big screen in some fashion.
Renegade Creative’s The Curse of La Patasola is based solely on a Central and South American succubus-like entity whose name translates to “one-legged.” The co-author, AJ Jones, makes his feature film debut alongside Shaun Mathis. Jones, along with his wife, producer Gillie Jones, features in the film as one of the leads.
Patasola, a vampiric beast that emerges from the jungle when male hunters or loggers start fantasizing about women, is enough to make us flee in dread. That is, assuming Patasola did not disguise itself as a lovely creature only to reveal its hideous true form when it was too late, as mythology claims. Isn’t it thrilling and terrifying at the same time? The makers of the independent horror film The Curse of La Patasola hope to achieve this tone.
The story appears to be amazing, with a lot of potential for scary situations. Because history began in South America, all retellings must incorporate South American sites and personalities. Although the film is well-made, the use of Western characters to probe a southern American folk tale feels unnecessary and excessive.
The first act of a horror film is usually based on a cold opening, which features the death of an unknown person. The purpose of this segment of the film is to set the tone and introduce the threats that will soon befall the film’s main characters. The Curse of La Patasola, on the other hand, has a slow start that does little to advance the plot. In reality, all we know is that when a couple covertly kisses in the woods in southern Colombia in the nineteenth century, the male is assaulted.
When You Hear Her Song It’s Too Late To Run – The Curse Of La Patasola (2022)
The movie is just another generic horror film set in a remote woodland location where humans are terrorized by an evil ghost.
It starts with two suffering couples who are stalked by the infamous monster, putting their marriages, morals, and desire to survive to the test. The film represents actor/writer AJ Jones’ directorial debut, with a script founded by Jones and Florida native Daniela Gonzalez.
It is a character-driven drama that we believe will appeal to a wide range of audiences.
James and Daniel are supposed to be closest friends, yet neither their friendship nor their relationships with Sarah and Naomi appear plausible. If the tension in the automobile wasn’t enough, the eerie woodland that surrounds the four passengers gets increasingly terrifying as the sunsets. A stiff park ranger cautions the carload of passengers about a huge frequency in the region but does little to deter the four visitors from venturing to Bear Lake equipped only with a flare gun.
On the way to a campground, Daniel and Naomi, the two couples, are having an ugly dispute. Sarah is stuck in the midst, attempting to persuade Daniel to quit antagonizing Naomi. Daniel is slamming feminism for making males seem bad, and Naomi is hitting back with more venomous retorts while blaming James for attempting to play mediator instead of supporting her.
Along the way, the party is intercepted by a policeman who advises them that there’s been an unusually high number of incident reports involving missing individuals recently and that they should take precautions. While she narrates the narrative, Daniel stops her and attempts to show her sexist character while highlighting her feminism. Sarah and James are unable to intervene.
All they could do is try to cool things down. Unbeknownst to them, it is the heat that ignites a fire within Daniel and Naomi. It’s not loving or anything remotely like it. They both have a feeling of authority, or rather, the sense of authority that Naomi and Daniel assign to one another. They eventually wind up kissing one another, which, predictably, enrages La Patasola. This is exactly what Naomi intended when she said the above-mentioned sentences word for word. La Patasola’s arrival was beckoned by the unfaithful kiss.
Naturally, they disregard this advice and continue with their camping trip. Naomi and Daniel’s squabbling resumes once the tents are removed and the fire is lit. Meanwhile, Naomi claims to have had the scariest ghost stories as they tell them.
Naomi then tells a story of a lady who was murdered because she cheated on her husband. The woman’s sadness and suffering were so tremendous that she transformed into a supernatural creature that punishes individuals who cheat on the people they ostensibly love. Naomi is forced to recite the legend’s name, La Patasola, even if she does not want to.
La Patasola, a cursed ghost, haunts woodland regions and exacts retribution on dishonest men by killing them while inhabiting the bodies of disloyal women. La Patasola occupies these bodies because she is a monstrous monster in her true form. The opening sequence of the film takes place in Columbia and depicts an anonymous couple enjoying a nocturnal tryst in the woods and enjoying an evident experience with La Patasola. The woman is a mother and wife, but she is not married to her boyfriend in the woods.
What follows is a paraphrase of what the legend says. La Patasola’s mesmerizing voice leads Daniel deep into the woods at midnight. Naomi is also possessed by her. At the end of the film, Daniel is murdered by a possessed Naomi, and Sarah murders Naomi in retaliation for La Patasola staging a love between Daniel and Naomi in front of her.
La Patasola exacts her vengeance on the unfaithful guy by murdering the lady in the same way that her husband killed her for adultery. The truth that La Patasola murders Naomi at Sarah’s hands serves as her punishment. Her husband also murdered her for being unfaithful.
Then the man hears another woman’s voice nearby calling, “Come find me,” several times, so he leaves his girlfriend to explore the area of the woods where he believes he heard the voice. When the man can be heard shouting in the distance, it’s easy to anticipate what follows next. Luciana Faulhaber plays La Patasola in the film, which mainly consists of her strolling about in a white outfit and attempting to appear mysterious. Any monster visuals in the film are just unimpressive.
In order for La Patasola to occur, someone must cheat, hence the narrative demands a cheater. Two couples that are all alone in the woods become four people who are unhappy in their relationships. The forty minutes of character building just so the plot may contain two-person cheating seemed to be excessive. Furthermore, because the marital squabbles go so long, whatever tension built at the bonfire scene is buried behind Lifetime movie circumstances.
For La Patasola to happen, somebody should cheat, consequently, the narrative demands a cheater. Two couples that are isolated in the woods become four individuals who are troubled in their connections. The forty minutes of character constructing just so the plot might contain two people cheating appeared to be over the top. Moreover, because the marital squabbles go so long, whatever tension built at the bonfire scene is buried behind Lifetime movie circumstances.
Is Forgiveness a Liberation? The other side of the story
Following the murders of Daniel and Naomi, there is a chase scene in which James and Sarah attempt to flee from La Patasola, who has become her monster form. It appears that she had no intention of injuring James as he was clean.
She was chasing Sarah because, according to her, she would be in the same situation as La Patasola’s spouse, i.e., she had been cheated on. Patasola wished for Sarah to trust Daniel, just as she wanted for her husband to accept her. La Patasola calms down as Sarah puts on Daniel’s ring and forgives him. Mateo, most likely her husband’s name, escapes her lips. As she peers James and Sarah, both of which have forgiven their husbands, she wishes her husband has forgiven her.
La Patasola appears to be free of her shackles. Her sheer existence at the end of the film, though, suggests otherwise. She wouldn’t be around if she was liberated. As a result, the film leaves us with an open ending.
Vampiric Female Monster From Amazonian Folklore
The Patasola, or “one leg,” is one of the numerous fables in South American mythology about female creatures from the bush that emerge in the middle of the woods to male hunters when they ponder about women. The Patasola takes the guise of a beautiful and attractive woman, typically in the appearance of a loved one, who pulls a man far into the bush away from his friends. There, the Patasola displays her full, horrific form as a one-legged monster with a voracious vampire-like desire for human blood and flesh, attacking and consuming her victims’ flesh or drinking their blood.
A thriller’s starting part commonly depends on a cold opening, which includes the abrupt passing of obscure characters. The target of this part of the film is to make the tone and to rapidly introduce the threats that will soon befall the film’s key protagonists.
Following the murders of Daniel and Naomi, there is a chase scene in which James and Sarah attempt to flee from La Patasola, who has become her monster form. It appears that she had no intention of injuring James as he was clean. She was chasing Sarah because, according to her, she would be in the same situation as La Patasola’s spouse, i.e., she had been cheated on.
Patasola wished for Sarah to believe Daniel, just as she wished for her father to forgive her. La Patasola calms down as Sarah puts on Daniel’s ring and forgives him. Mateo, which is most likely her husband’s name, escapes her lips. La Patasola appears to be free of her shackles. Her sheer existence in the final scene, though, suggests otherwise. She will not be around if she was liberated.
Why should you watch The Curse of La Patasola?
The Curse of La Patasola opens with a prolog set in nineteenth-century Columbia. Unnoticed, a pair disappears into the woods. Or so they believe. A voice from the woods calls to them. The woman wisely advises her partner to depart. He, of course, pursues the unidentified speaker. Screams and noises of unseen brutality are heard. Remember, and become accustomed to, the invisible aspect.
The director based their picture on La Patasola, a South American folklore creature that, as far as I know, has never been used on-screen before. It’s something unique in The Curse of La Patasola.
We have warring characters with who I can’t imagine becoming friends. James has purchased a ring and intends to propose. Naomi is a strong-willed black lady. Daniel is the sort of man who should be in charge of everything, but he’s unemployed and surviving off his wife’s salary. The ranger issued a warning. That’s only in the first fifteen minutes.
In the movie, the creature is either kept off-screen or the scenes are too dark to see anything until the last several minutes when you’ll see why they kept it concealed.
Instead, it provides us with practically unending discourse, much of it is about the couple’s relationship problems. Some flaws are That the horror is restricted to the rare “Did you hear that?” moment and pretty much everything Daniel says. As a result, the film’s effort at a storyline surprise is both predictable and comical.
When The Curse of La Patasola realizes it’s intended to be a horror film in the last act, it adds fuel to the fire by dismissing all of La Patasola’s legend. It was evident from the beginning that they would have to do so in order for the film to succeed.
A few things are correct in The Curse of La Patasola. The actors do a good job of conveying the discomfort of a friend’s weekend gone tragically wrong. I’d rather they were instilling fear of a dangerous camping trip, but I’ll take what I can get.
The best moment in The Curse of La Patasola is one in which two ladies talk openly about their lives while having a cigarette. Najah Bradley is by far the most fascinating and charismatic performer in the company, and her confidence and undivided focus carry most of this sequence. Gillie Jones pulls up her part of the bargain, but Bradley is the actual movie star in the movie. Bradley’s outstanding performance was responsible for most of what little I liked about The Curse of La Patasola.
Aside from Bradley, The Curse of La Patasola doesn’t provide much in the way of originality. With distant cries from creepy voices, heavy fog, and ridiculous jump scares, the film goes with the flow of your normal modern bad ghost/demon/monster scenario. A.J Jones directs a pretty conventional, very basic take on this well-known genre. The Curse of La Patasola, which was released on the same day as The Legend of La Llorona, is the better of the two horror films based on Central American stories, but that’s a fairly low standard.
Now, the performances, some are sloppy, some are good, but for the most part, “La Patasola” is a one-of-a-kind drama. I will say it’s very solid in the beginning, maybe three times those scars were nicely done for a movie that didn’t have a huge budget. It’s also clear that the Director has researched Horror and clichés since the photography was rather superb for what I witnessed.