APARTMENT 7A

Here is the plain answer. This is a horror movie that glorifies satanic worship, treats abortion as ordinary, and presents suicide as a way out of a spiritual problem. There is no reading of that content a Christian viewer should invite into their home.

The tragedy is that some of the craft is real. Julia Garner is genuinely good as the anxious dancer at the center, the musical numbers are staged with flair, and the frightening scenes are tense and well-shot. But good acting can't rescue material this hollow — the cinematography is amateurish, the characters are flat, and the pacing drags.

More to the point, none of that redeems the worldview. The Bible and a rosary appear, then do nothing; evil wins, the cult marches on, and the heroine learns nothing. So our answer is simple: don't spend your evening here.

New York City, the 1960s. Theresa "Terry" Gionoffrio (Julia Garner) is a young tap dancer chasing a Broadway break — until a fall on stage twists her ankle, wrecks her reputation, and leaves her limping, broke, and dependent on painkillers.

Then a wealthy elderly couple from the Bramford apartment complex, Minnie and Roman Castevet, take her in. They nurse her back to health and offer to cover her rent until her next big break, if she cleans up her act. It's the lifeline she needs. It is also, of course, far too good to be true.

Two stars, and they're generous. What works is narrow but real: Julia Garner carries the film as the anxiety-riddled lead, the hallucinatory Broadway numbers are elaborate and well-staged, and the "scary scenes" — where Terry faces mortal or demonic threats — are tense, well-shot, and genuinely frightening.

The problem is everything around those moments. The cinematography is uninventive and plays like an amateur streaming drama, the color grading is dull, the characters are flatter than cardboard, and the pacing is a slog. Adapted from a sensational 1960s novel and film, this version is bland where it should be gripping, and it builds to an unsatisfying climax that pays off nothing. Decent actors, wasted on lifeless material.

This film's moral framework is its central failure. It endorses a selfish, pro-satanic worldview: literal demons, a cult of Satan worshippers performing black magic and occult chants, multiple characters possessed and tortured, dancers who drink heavily and sleep their way toward roles. Everyone — heroine, friends, and villains alike — cares only about advancing a career, never about being ethical.

The Christian faith appears only to be shown as useless. Terry visits a Catholic church to pray, but never follows through. She's given a rosary and a Bible; they ward off nothing. Faith is set dressing in a world where evil holds all the power.

Then comes the moral rot at the center. Terry is impregnated with a demon child against her will. She schedules an abortion — treated matter-of-factly — that the demon interrupts. The film frames giving up her career for motherhood as a "bad" thing. And in the only selfless act it offers her, her escape from the satanic nightmare is presented as suicide — depressing, disturbing, and dressed up as a solution. Evil remains unchecked; the cult moves on to its next victim; the heroine learns nothing.

Scripture measures this by a different light: "Resist the devil, and he will flee from you" (James 4:7). This film insists he never does.

There's craft here — a strong lead performance and some genuinely frightening scenes — but it's welded to a worldview that glorifies Satan, normalizes abortion, and calls suicide a way out. No amount of technique redeems that. So here's our answer, the same one we opened with: skip it. Looking for something worth your evening instead? Try our latest family-friendly picks.