'Annabelle: Creation' makes for a scary good horror sequel

If we have learned anything from the Cooking Channel, it's that talent isn't defined by the ingredients you use but what you do with them. By that measure, director David F. Sandberg is an alchemist of the first order, taking the base - even leaden - components of horror and whipping them into a shivery chiffon of dread.

The Swedish filmmaker did it with his debut feature, "Lights Out." And he has done it again - with even cheesier material - taking the cliche-filled pantry of the Devil-doll prequel "Annabelle: Creation" and turning out a dish that is uncommonly, nerve-wrackingly satisfying.

The recipe Sandberg uses is one we've seen before, mixing bits and pieces from a screenplay by Gary Dauberman (who also wrote the much less effective "Annabelle," a 2014 spinoff from "The Conjuring").

The 1950s-set tale centers on orphans living in a remote, sprawling house, complete with balky electricity, a drafty dumbwaiter and an abundance of secret spaces. The house's proprietor is a retired doll maker, whose magnum opus is the titular, demented-looking poppet - one you wouldn't expect to see on any sane person's bookshelf, let alone in the toy aisle.

Twelve years after losing their daughter in a car accident - shown in a startlingly abrupt prologue - Sam and Esther Mullins (Anthony LaPaglia and Miranda Otto) open their home to six orphaned girls and a nun (Stephanie Sigman). The youngest of the girls are sisters Linda (Lulu Wilson) and Janice (Talitha Bateman), the latter of whom walks with a leg brace and crutch as the result of polio. Sandberg makes good use of her limited mobility, as you might expect.

In short order, Janice begins to see spooky apparitions. And the aforementioned doll - which she discovers in a locked room lined with pages from the Bible - just won't stay put.

None of this is new, and in lesser hands it would easily become tedious. But Sandberg knows how to ratchet up suspense, composing shots filled with beautiful shadows, in whose corners there always seems to be lurking something scary.