Hell Hath No Fury Like a PG-13 Rating
There are bad horror movies, and then there’s The Haunting of Molly Hartley — a supernatural thriller so timid that it feels like Satan himself signed a non-disclosure agreement. Directed by Mickey Liddell and written by John Travis and Rebecca Sonnenshine, this 2008 stinker is what happens when Hollywood tries to make a Rosemary’s Baby for teens who think “The Exorcist” is too long and “Twilight” is too scary.
This is a horror movie about making a deal with the devil — only without the horror, or the deal, or the devil doing anything remotely interesting. It’s 85 minutes of jump scares, prep-school angst, and Chace Crawford’s hair heroically surviving demonic possession.
It’s less The Haunting of Molly Hartley and more The Mildly Inconveniencing of Molly Hartley.
Plot: The Devil Wears Abercrombie
The movie opens with a prologue so cliché it might as well come with a “Welcome to Genericville” sign. In 1997, a teenage girl named Laurel tells her father she’s going to marry her boyfriend. Dad, being the kind of guy who probably Googled “how to prevent satanic destiny,” promptly drives them off the road and stabs her with a broken mirror. You know — the kind of father-daughter bonding that leads to therapy bills in hell.
Cut to present day: 17-year-old Molly Hartley (Haley Bennett) is recovering from a little thing called being stabbed in the chest by her mother. Her dad (Jake Weber, collecting a paycheck and a migraine) moves them to a new town so she can start over. Because if there’s one thing teenage trauma victims love, it’s being the mysterious new girl at a Christian prep school.
As Molly’s 18th birthday approaches, she starts hearing whispers, seeing ghosts, and acting like she just watched The Omen on an empty stomach. She’s haunted by weird visions of her mother, nightmares involving fire, and classmates who either want to baptize her or shove her into a locker.
She meets Joseph (Chace Crawford, looking like a catalog model who accidentally wandered into a horror movie) and his ex-girlfriend Suzie (AnnaLynne McCord, clearly practicing for 90210). Suzie calls Molly “one of them,” which sounds mysterious until you realize it’s code for “I read the script.”
Eventually, Molly learns that she was stillborn, and her parents made a pact with the devil to bring her back to life. The catch? She belongs to Satan when she turns 18 — which explains her migraines, mood swings, and maybe the entire film’s existence.
The Baptism of Dullness
When the truth comes out, Molly tries to escape her fate through the time-honored horror tradition of poor decision-making. She flees to a church where a girl named Alexis offers to baptize her. Naturally, this goes badly, because Alexis’s idea of salvation involves attempted drowning.
After a brief scuffle that ends with Alexis taking a fatal bonk to the head (Jesus take the wheel — or the font), Molly runs to Joseph for help. That’s when she learns that Joseph is also one of Satan’s little helpers. You’d think the devil would hire someone with more charisma, but hey, maybe all the good demons were busy doing cameos in Supernatural.
Dr. Emerson (Nina Siemaszko) shows up to explain the plot again — because even the filmmakers know the audience’s eyes have glazed over — and gives Molly the classic “kill your dad or join the dark side” ultimatum. Molly, ever the innovator, opts for option C: stab yourself with a kitchen knife.
Unfortunately for Molly, it’s already midnight. The devil claims his prize. And honestly? I wish he’d taken me too, just to end the movie faster.
The Big Twist (That Everyone Saw Coming in the Trailer)
Flash forward: Molly’s in a psychiatric hospital, now completely owned by Satan and rocking a new “corporate evil chic” aesthetic. Her father’s there too, muttering like a man who just realized he’s in the worst possible version of The Omen.
Molly graduates high school, becomes valedictorian (hell apparently values GPAs), and rides off in a limo with Joseph, the world’s most boring spawn of hell. Dr. Emerson, now posing as her school counselor, congratulates her on joining Team Lucifer. Molly smiles smugly, and we fade out on her perfectly hair-sprayed evil smirk.
Congratulations — the Antichrist has arrived, and she looks ready for prom.
Haley Bennett: Hell’s Least Convincing Chosen One
Haley Bennett spends most of the movie alternating between confusion, mild panic, and the occasional bout of overacting. She’s not bad, per se — she’s just trapped in a script that gives her nothing to do but stare into mirrors and gasp dramatically.
Her version of “possessed” looks suspiciously like “mildly constipated.” When she’s supposed to be terrified, she just squints harder. When she’s supposed to be seduced by evil, she looks like she’s debating what to order at Starbucks.
Chace Crawford, meanwhile, plays Joseph as if he’s allergic to emotional expression. His entire performance consists of one furrowed brow and a pout so pronounced it deserves its own billing. He’s supposed to be mysterious and menacing — but mostly he just looks like a rejected Hollister model haunted by his own reflection.
Jake Weber, as Molly’s dad, gives the film its only hint of sincerity, though he spends most of his screen time looking like he’d rather be back fighting the undead on Dawn of the Dead.
And AnnaLynne McCord? She chews through her brief screen time with enough intensity to make you wish she’d been the protagonist. If the devil wanted a proper emissary, he should’ve picked her instead of discount-store Buffy.
The Horror: Satan by Way of Soap Opera
The Haunting of Molly Hartley wants to be scary but is so neutered by its PG-13 rating that it can’t even commit to being mildly unsettling. The “haunting” consists mostly of loud noises, quick cuts, and people walking down hallways too slowly.
There’s no blood, no tension, and no atmosphere — just endless high school melodrama punctuated by the occasional vision of someone whispering “Molly…” in surround sound. The cinematography is so clean it looks like a skincare commercial for the damned.
The soundtrack tries to sell you on dread with the subtlety of a jackhammer. Every time Molly opens a door, the violins scream like they’re being exorcised.
And yet, despite all the noise, nothing actually happens. No demons. No possessions. Just therapy sessions, nightmares, and the slow realization that the real horror is how long this movie feels.
A Pact with the Devil (and Mediocrity)
You can tell The Haunting of Molly Hartley was built for teenage audiences who wanted to dip their toes into horror without risking actual nightmares. It’s a movie about the devil that’s somehow afraid to be bad.
Even the devil himself barely shows up. For a film about eternal damnation, it’s weirdly bureaucratic — like Satan outsourced the haunting to a middle manager. The script treats demonic destiny like a college application process: stressful, confusing, and ultimately meaningless.
By the time the credits roll, the film has managed to say absolutely nothing about faith, fate, or fear. It’s just a morality tale with none of the morality — or the tale.
Final Verdict: Possessed by Boredom
The Haunting of Molly Hartley isn’t just a bad horror movie. It’s an anti-horror movie — a vacuum of suspense where even Satan seems to have checked out halfway through.
The performances are wooden, the scares are toothless, and the ending feels like a corporate orientation for Hell Inc. If you’ve ever wondered what would happen if Mean Girls tried to summon the devil but forgot the Latin, this is your answer.
For all its talk of damnation, the only thing truly cursed here is the audience.
Grade: D (for “Devilishly Dull”)
If you want to see a soul sold to darkness, skip the movie and check the résumés of everyone who agreed to star in it. Watching The Haunting of Molly Hartley won’t damn your soul — but it might make you wish it would, just to escape the boredom.
