The Offering (2023 film)

It stars Nick Blood, Emily Wiseman, Allan Corduner, Paul Kaye, Daniel Ben Zenou and Jodie Jacobs.

Arthur (Art) and his pregnant wife come to Brooklyn to visit his father, who runs a Jewish funeral house in a Hasidic community.

While preparing the body, the amulet around his neck falls through a drain, releasing the demon which immediately begins to haunt Claire.

He is told that Yosille needs a police clearance before he can be buried or a next-of-kin must sign off on it, even though it was a clear suicide.

He discovers Yosille was attempting to conjure the archangel of life, Martiel, so that he could bring back his dead wife Aida.

When Claire tells her husband Aida is here to see Yosille's body, Art realizes his wife is in danger.

They discover the sigil and Chayim says that the demon gains strength and is fed when a child steps in it.

[6] Safety measures the production crew followed included mask wearing and regular COVID tests and temperature checks.

[7] In February 2024, Millennium Media president Jonathan Yunger stated that, after a practical special effect for a film's demon character proved disappointing, he used generative artificial intelligence to make numerous replacement creature designs, which were passed on to visual effects.

[8] This was initially reported as a production detail for Hellboy: The Crooked Man, but in May 2024 that film's director Brian Taylor said that Yunger had been referring to The Offering.

The site's consensus reads: "Within the outline of its fairly standard story, The Offering puts a unique--and often genuinely scary--spin on demonic possession horror tropes".

[11] In a review for Variety, Dennis Harvey described The Offering as "a lively but cluttered pileup of jump scares with too few original ideas".

[3] Brian Tallerico of RogerEbert.com gave the film 2.5 out of 4 stars, referring to it as a "surprisingly strong genre alternative".

He noted that the "performances are a mixed bag", with the older actors seeming to "understand the assignment" better than their younger counterparts.

[12] Christian Zilko of IndieWire gave the film a grade of A− and praised its craftsmanship and production design.

He pointed out that The Offering was "too reliant on jumpscares" but went on to praise Allan Corduner and Paul Kaye's performances and noted that despite its lack of originality, it still delivered "good-old fashion horror fun".