Director: James Wan (Saw, Dead Silence)
Screenplay: Leigh Whannell
Producers: Jason Blum, Oren Peli, Steven Schneider
Starring: Patrick Wilson, Rose Byrne, Ty Simpkins, Lin Shaye, Barbara Hershey
MPAA Rating: PG-13
Running time: 103 min.

(3/5)

It looks like we may finally be moving away from torture porn. The genre which emerged as a powerhouse a few years ago with Saw and Hostel leading the pack seems to, finally, be taking a back-seat (except for the yearly gore fest of the ever present Saw). It’s interesting to me that one of the directors who kicked off that short-lived but well represented movement moved on with little interest in sequels.

I haven’t caught up with any of James Wan’s work post Saw but I was curious about Insidious. Most of it was cast; I like both Rose Byrne (Renai) and Patrick Wilson (Josh) while appearances by Barbara Hershey and Lin Shaye always peak my curiosity, but I also love a good scare and they don’t come around often enough.

A young family moves into a new home and things immediately start to go sour. At first, it seems like just strange noises but it quickly worsens and one of the children falls into a comma. The doctors don’t know what’s wrong but Dalton is unresponsive to stimulus. Things go from bad to worse as Josh withdraws from the family leaving Renai to take on the brunt of the added stress. With a son in a coma and a wife in hysterics that the house is haunted, Josh is quickly convinced that moving might help the family return to some semblance of normalcy though its evidently clear that he’s simply trying to avoid confrontation. The family isn’t even unpacked at the new place with things start going wrong and this time, in much more violent ways. At the end of her rope, Renai seeks help. Enter Josh’s mom (played by Hershey) who recommends Elise (Lin Shaye), some sort of spiritualist.

Insidious isn’t simply a haunted house movie. Though it starts that way, and very effectively too, the introduction of Elise gives Wan and frequent collaborator Leigh Whannell the opportunity to throw a wrench into the proceedings and so they do, developing a second connected story that nearly feels like a different film. It’s a bit jarring but the changing story works by delivering something unexpected, a trick that Wan and Whannell have mastered.

For the most part, Insidious works really well by mostly avoiding jump scares and delivering truly scary images and moments that linger. I didn’t care much for the second part of the film which enters the world of “The Further” and incorporates some striking but mostly bland monsters. I found this second act provided few scares but showcased Wan and Whannell’s imagination and their passion for creating something new while borrowing heavily from the masters that came before, most notably in this case Argento whose iconic use of colour makes an appearance in the second half of the film.

My one major complaint about Insidious is the lack of emotion from Byrne and Wilson. Though they deliver their lines beautifully, there’s very little passion behind them and I didn’t find either performance particularly good though Byrne’s was most disappointing. She has the showier roll here and though she falls into hysterics more than once, there’s no real force behind it. Both actors are outdone by Hershey and Shaye in much smaller roles. This lack of emotion removed me from the story which detracted from the effectiveness of the scares; I simply didn’t care about any of the characters.

There are some great moments in Insidious and I mostly enjoyed James Wan’s vision of terror but I can’t say it did much to scare me. Still, it was refreshing to see a new spin on a familiar tale and as long as he keeps delivering the curve balls, I’ll keep watching what he has to offer.

Insidious is out on DVD and Blu-ray today, Tuesday, July 12th.

DVD Extras: Extras include a “horror 101” discussion by Wan and writer Whannell in which they review the tropes visited in the film and how they were incorporated, a behind the scenes featurette as well as a discussion on the monsters of Insidious.