Insidious

Insidious

Director: James Wan
Writer: Leigh Whannell

Released: September 14, 2010 (TIFF - Toronto International Film Festival)
    April 1, 2011 (United States)

1 hour 42 minutes, English

Renai Lambert: Rose Byrne
Josh Lambert: Patrick Wilson
Dalton Lambert: Ty Simpkins
Foster Lambert: Andrew Astor
Cali Lambert:
Lorraine Lambert: Barbara Hershey
Elise Reiner: Lin Shaye



I saw Insidious with Bolingbroke yesterday, I wanted to watch it when it came out in theaters, but I’m cheap and will wait for movies to come out on TV. Wow! Worth the wait and I do regret not watching it in a pitch black room with ultra mega loud surround sound. I honestly think Horror movies have been getting overworked. Yes, it’s nice to see dismembered bodies and gushing blood, but, let’s not forget that beautiful and iconic scene from Halloween where Jamie Lee Curtis is facing the camera, shadows behind her, and then suddenly Michael Myers’ mask slowly appears. Genius, it still takes my breath away. This movie, goes back to that.

Simple, with the right lighting, and best of all, no DMX songs to accompany any (there weren’t) chase scenes. There was a Tiny Tim song though. I actually screamed, girl screamed, twice or thrice. This is the first Horror movie to do so since I saw Chuckie back in my youth. Murderous dolls are freaky, mmkay?  Taking this from Wikipedia - “ ‘Steve O’Brien from WCBS-FM says “Most Terrifying Film since The Exorcist.” Normally I would agree, but having recently gotten over my “never-watching-The Exorcist-alone” thing, I realized, it’s small potatoes in the scare category. Acting, camera work, it’s all there, but it just doesn’t scare me anymore, in fact it‘s quite revolting, which is why I watch it when I cook. ;]

Back to Insidious. This movie is about the Lambert family who have recently moved into a new home. There’s Renai and Josh, mother and father to Dalton, Foster and Cali. A quick summary: while exploring the attic, Dalton Lambert climbs a ladder, is frightened by something he see’s in the shadows and falls down, he then screams bloody murder. Renai and Josh run to him, console him and then see him to bed. In the morning Josh tries to wake him up but Dalton is unresponsive. He has entered a comatose state that doctors can’t explain the reason for. Three months later Dalton is moved back into the house and then things start to really get weird. A priest, ghost hunters and psychic are brought in. Ghosts, demons, evil. Will it all go away, will the Lambert family be safe? Watch the movie and find out.

Things I didn’t like: I do and don’t like the lighting in this movie. It’s very dark and that adds to the tension, but during high action scenes where all you can see is a bit of shirt moving to and fro…it leaves a lot to the imagination. Is that what the director wanted? One review said the second half of the movie wouldn’t be able to live up to the first, not true for me. It was the third part of the movie, actually, more like the last quarter. The ending was good, but it could have been better. You get a slap when it could have just gone and knocked you out. There was a bit of reality stretching, but I didn’t mind it. And I believe that’s all that irked me. This really was a great movie.

~Salinger