For various reasons, I don’t watch a lot of modern films. I almost never go to the theater anymore and at home I tend to go for classic movies or movies with at least a decade or two under their belt. I do watch new movies every now and again. Ones that get rave reviews eventually make it to my queue, but more often than not they don’t get watched until they are at least a few years old.

There isn’t a judgment hidden in that paragraph. I’ve got nothing against new movies, many of them are quite good, I’ve just become a classic movie fan. I like the history of those old movies. I like that even when I watch a bad movie that was made way before I was born it feels like it was worth watching. It helps me understand cinema better. Whereas when I watch a bad modern movie I feel like I’ve just wasted my time.

Watching a lot of old movies and not watching a lot of new ones tends to skew my perceptions of what’s popular. I miss a lot of trends. I don’t necessarily know all the new stars and filmmakers. I keep my nose in pop culture enough that I tend to know names and faces, but I haven’t always seen the films and shows from the newest, hottest celebrities.

This is the long way around to say I’ve only seen one other movie starring Sydney Sweeney (I think I’ve seen her in a couple of other films but in small roles where she wasn’t particularly noticeable).

I’ve been hearing Ms. Sweeney’s name a lot lately. For a hot minute, it seemed like she was everywhere. I’m not exactly sure why, I don’t pay that close attention to pop culture buzz. She was on Saturday Night Live I think and then there was something about her cleavage and her fame skyrocketed.

A few months ago I saw her in Reality, a pretty good movie based on a real-life story about a woman leaking secret documents to the media. I didn’t even realize it was Sweeney until the credits rolled. She was good in it and I made a note to check her out in other things.

This has been an even longer way around to say I just watched Sydney Sweeney star in Immaculate, a pretty okay horror film with an absolutely brilliant ending.

I’m tired. It has been a long day which concluded a long week. I ramble when I’m tired. Sorry.

In Immaculate Sweeney plays Sister Cecilia a Catholic novice who has just arrived at an Italian convent where she is to take her vows. She’s an American with no connection to Italy. She doesn’t even speak the language. But her previous church floundered due to lack of attendance and Father Tedeschi (Álvaro Morte) talked her into coming to Italy.

We get bits and pieces of her backstory. A near-death experience as a child left her feeling God has a plan for her, but she hasn’t quite figured out what that might be. It is never clear if her piousness is real and deeply felt, or if it stems from her need to find purpose.

At one point in the film another nun tells her that this convent is not the place to find herself, it is a place of hard work and devotion. Sister Cecilia swears she understands but she lacks conviction.

Strange things are afoot at the nunnery. Director Michael Mohan fills the screen with most of the tropes from this type of gothic religious horror film. If you are a fan you’ve seen most of what happens here before, and probably in better form. There are creepy nuns, creepier people in dark robes, disturbing priests, candle-filled rituals, and lots of jump scares.

Cecilia finds herself pregnant. She swears she’s never had sex before and we believe her as that’s where the title of the film comes from. I won’t spoil how this happened, but let’s just say the convent is more of a cult than a church (I’ll let you make your own jokes about how all churches are cult-like).

The thing is for the first two-thirds of the film’s run time it is all kind of tame. It isn’t bad necessarily, but it isn’t all that thrilling either. Like I say I’ve seen this done before, better. I never quite buy into Cecilia’s arc. I never felt like she was a true believer. But who she really is, isn’t explored very deeply.

But here’s the other thing, make it through those boring parts. The end is worth it. Sweeney is much more comfortable with the scream queen aspects of this role than the faith-filled parts. As things start to unravel (and boy do they unravel) I start to see why she’s become such a star. It concludes with a long take that’s really quite something.

And that’s all I’ll say about that.