RECENT WATCHES: Insidious: The Red Door (2023)

Of the three highly successful horror franchise that James Wan has had a hand in creating, “Insidious” always feels like the one that slipped through the cracks. (Or into the Further, I suppose.) The yearly “Saw” sequels defined the genre in the 2000s, birthing the torture trend of debatable merit. “The Conjuring” – which “Insidious” always felt like a prototype for – has become the highest grossing series in the genre, thanks to its web of interconnected spin-offs. Every time a new “Insidious” movie comes out, meanwhile, my reaction is always one of bemused disbelief. Maybe that's because the series became the blue print for countless other generic Blumhouse chillers, thoroughly slotting it into the “been-there-done-that” corner of my brain. Nevertheless, they make money. “Insidious: The Red Door” became a surprise hit in summer of 2023, showing that there was still an appetitive for this kind of thing even after the five year break from the last one. It became a feather in the cap of star Patrick Wilson, successfully making the transition into directing with the fifth installment. 

Last time we saw the Lambert family was in 2013's “Insidious: Chapter 2,” undergoing hypnosis to forget their traumatic experiences with the possessing spirits of the Further. It wasn't enough to save Josh and Renai's marriage, the two separating in the last decade. Dalton, the center of the paranormal activity, is now a moody teenager, leaving home to attend art school. His relationship with his dad is tense, despite the best efforts to rekindle their bond. Encouraged by his art teacher, Dalton begins to probe his reoccurring nightmares for artistic inspiration. He begins painting images of an ominous red door while experiencing increasingly frightening visions. Josh digs into his own childhood for answers, discovering that he inherited his astral abilities from his own father. Father and son will have to travel back into the Further if they hope to close the door forever.

“Insidious” has always been a series about childhood trauma, repression of bad memories, and the fear of passing your worst qualities on to your children. By returning to the Lambert family a decade after we first met them, “The Red Door” foregrounds these themes in a big way. The end of “Chapter 2" had them burying their knowledge of the Further via hypnosis which, this installment suggests, maybe wasn't the best way to handle things. Dalton and his sibling admittedly have some fucked-up childhood memories to unpack, what with their father being possessed by the ghost of a serial killer and attempting to kill them. Dalton is a young adult now, played by a now 24 year old Ty Simpkins, and such a childhood did not beget a close relationship with his dad. His parents are divorced – that feels realistic – and he's struggling to forge a relationship with a father who is clearly still processing his own traumatic youth. All of this being triggered by the death of his mom – Barbara Hershey getting a brief cameo as a photograph atop a casket – makes the ideas clearer. As you get older, your childhood fears and hang-ups don't disappear. They merely change shape.

In fact, “The Red Door” comes away feeling like a strangely personal project for Patrick Wilson. This is the first “Insidious” film not to be written solely by Leigh Whannell, Scott Teems of multiple Blumhouse reboots handling scripting duties. It still feels a little bit like a Patrick Wilson vanity project. His wife has a cameo and he duets with Ghost for the cover that plays over the end credits, for further examples of that. That so much of the story revolves around a very divorced dad struggling with reconnecting with his son, processing his mom's death, and putting his own father's legacy to bed makes me wonder if the star/director or someone else working on the sequel wasn't injecting their own issues into the material. This isn't truly an issue until the last act, when “The Red Door” starts to feel less like a horror sequel and more like an especially maudlin therapy session filtered through a genre lens. Much has been written about how pop-psychology speak has infiltrated Hollywood screenwriting. Examples like this, where characters stop to apologize for their mistakes and directly address their personality flaws, are hard not to notice.

While we might be watching Patrick Wilson work through some deeply personal issues of his own in “The Red Door,” it must be said that he has a good grip on this style of horror film. The sequel doesn't focus on the loud jump-scares too much, a concentrated effort being made to build up an eerie atmosphere. More than once, the film deploys the quality gag of a figure lingering off in the distance, unnoticed by the protagonist. This not only sums up the thematic branches of the story, of how the memories of the dead hang around, but also a spooky set-up in its own right. There's a nice layer of fog floating over the ground at times, which always works for me. A sequence set inside an MRI machine slowly builds nicely, utilizing the claustrophobic setting to build up to a potent jolt. Like all “Insidious” movies, this one gets much goofier the further it goes along. Attempts to call-back to earlier installments mean re-visiting Tiny Tim and the Red Faced Demon but it's not badly done.

Despite the many things “Insidious: The Red Door” does right, the sequel still makes a considerable misstep. Josh Lambert is at the center of long stretches of the movie but he's not actually the protagonist of “The Red Door.” As a college student, Ty Simpkins plays Dalton as an angsty, artistic type. He's not an immediately likable character, far too wrapped up in his own Daddy issues. To compensate, the film gives him a sidekick in the form of Sinclair Daniel as Chris Winslow. She is his designated roommate, whose litany of eccentric behavior includes playing the harmonium at odd hours and forcing Dalton to attended an adult baby-themed frat party. The quirks are more irritating than endearing, the film failing to make us care about adult Dalton or his roommate too much. Splitting time between father and son is a flaw already, as it limits the interactions they have together.

“Insidious: The Red Door” often functions as the closing chapter of this particular franchise. Bringing the series back to the Lamberts creates a feeling of events coming full-circle. The conclusion suggests that the Red Door may be closed for good... Except, of course, a money-making horror franchise is rarely allowed to rest. Naturally, there's a last second teaser to suggest the possibility that the story will continue. The question of what the hell the Lipstick-Faced Demon is remains as well. Accordingly, both a sixth installment and a spin-off have been given the greenlight. Whether the saga of the Lambert family is truly concluded, or if these newer installments will follow the ghost-hunting narratives of the middle chapters, remains to be seen. I'm partial to the latter, as these movies tend to be a little better when focusing on that idea. Still, “The Red Door” is better than you'd expect the fourth sequel to be. [6/10]

RECENT WATCHES: Insidious: The Last Key (2018)

When the trailers for a fourth "Insidious" movie started to pop up in late 2017, I can recall my reaction exactly: Oh wow, they're still making these. "Insidious: Chapter 3" was the least successful installment in the series, which means it still made 113 million worldwide against an 11 million dollar budget. While that suggests audiences' appetite for these fog-strewn, supernatural shockers was growing satisfied, clearly Jason Blum and his flunkies felt a little more money could be squeezed out of this one. Leigh Whannell was drawn back in to provide the screenplay for "Insidious: The Last Key," the subtitle suggesting perhaps a degree of finality to this one. With James Wan far too busy with Warrens and race cars and Atlanteans, Adam Robitel of "The Taking of Deborah Logan" would be recruited to direct. Jaded horror fans and casual moviegoers were inundated with thrillers like this by 2018. Blumhouse's strategy of keeping budgets modest and finding release dates with little competition – the first weekend in January, this time – still managed to make the fourth trip into the Further a financially solvent one. 

Following the trend started by "Chapter 3," "The Last Key" is another prequel to the original "Insidious," following medium Elise Rainer and ghost hunters Tucker and Specs as they pursue a career as for-hire paranormal investigators. Ted Garza, a man living in Five Keys, New Mexico, reaches out to the trio about the ghostly activity in his home. It's a home Elise knows well. It's the one she grew up in, with her little brother Christian. Elise's ability to see spirits disturbed their father, who became abusive. Especially after Elise was lured into freeing a demon known as Keyface, that killed her mother. Now in her home town, Elise discovers the demons of her childhood still lurk around, possessing the living and threatening her family again... Including her nieces, Imogen and Melissa, the latter of which share her aunt's powers.

Much like the third chapter in the series, "The Last Key" gets surprisingly far simply by shifting Lin Shaye's Elise into the role of protagonist. While Shaye played second fiddle to a teenage heroine in "Chapter 3," she's the primary star of this one. The warm, grandmotherly aura that floats around her makes Shaye an immediately inviting presence. She's nice! You enjoy watching her help people, all the more because she's helping out of the kindness of her heart. Like Carl Kolchak or Mystery Inc. before them, Elise and her sidekick give the impression of blue collar paranormal investigators. Tucker and Specs brag about the cheesy artwork they paint on the side of their van or use their extremely niche area of expertise trying to impress women. Angus Sampson and Leigh Whannell have complimenting energies, different types of nerdiness and awkwardness that work off each other nicely. You can root for this gang, above all else. They are like a version of the Warrens in “The Conjuring” movies without all the weird baggage.

Like every horror movie made in the last decade, all of the “Insidious” movies have been about childhood trauma and grief. “The Last Key” emphasizes the former detail a lot, digging into Elise's fucked-up background. Her father rejected her supernatural abilities, his close-mindedness going hand-in-hand with a peculiar misogyny. He seems to think that children exist to be quiet and female children, in general, exist to be subservient to men. At the same time, Elise carries guilt around for leaving her brother behind in such an environment. Obviously, throughout this journey, she'll overcome this problem and confront the demons of her past. Perhaps a little too literally, as the second half has Elise encountering the actual ghosts of her past in the Further. However, I'll admit, I do admire “The Last Key” for not cloaking these ideas in allegory. This is a movie about overcoming the horrors of your childhood and there's a directness there I like.

Not that we watch “Insidious” movies for their especially deep characters. These are movies about scary faces jumping out of the dark at us, right? Cinematographer Toby Oliver – Greg McLean's D.P. on “Wolf Creek 2” and “The Darkness” who then became a regular on Blumhouse's horror pics, “Get Out” most notably – focuses more on murky, blue-black shadows over the eerie greens and layers of fog seen in the previous entries. This is an early sign that the film will not focus on the funhouse approach of the earlier “Insidouses.” There certainly are several jump-scares, of shrieking women appearing out of the darkness, but it would seem building a creepy, prolonged ambiance of suspense is the main goal here. This is most apparent in an extended sequence that involves Elise going through a series of suitcase in a spooky hallway, building in a drawn-out way towards one of the better scares in the entire series. Considering the “Insidious” movies tend to get silliest when throwing various monster faces at us, “The Last Key” does a better job than usual of avoiding that. 

By the time we got to “Saw IV,” for one example, the series was buried in continuity and backstory. Despite a sliding timeline that can be a bit confusing – this is, chronologically, the second film in the series – “Insidious: The Last Key” mostly avoids those pitfalls. There's a somewhat obscure lead-in into the events of the first movie. That ridiculous, Lipstick Faced Demon gets a cameo. Some of the rules, of how possession works through the Further, get a little weird. The antagonist is a scrawny, demonic figure played by Javier Botet, seemingly the go-to performer for playing scrawny, demonic figures these days. The so-called Keyface creates sparks when he drags his key-shaped fingertips across any surface, which seems like a blatant call-back to Freddy Krueger. Keyface – silly name, by the way – isn't as intimidating or interesting a villain as that guy. The mechanics used to defeat him are especially blurry, which probably reflects how these movies have never been great about that kind of consistency. 

The general reception to “Insidious: The Last Key” seems to be that it's one of the weaker installments. To be honest, I like these movies a lot more when they focus on the quirky ghost hunters rather than the square Lambert family. Bruce Davidson appears as Elise's brother, bringing a little bit of pathos to his handful of scenes. Spencer Locke and Caitlin Gerard are both decently likable as the nieces, playing off Shaye in a charming way. There's a surprisingly brutal head-crushing scene. Adam Robitel would go on to make the “Escape Room” movies for Blumhouse, which I'd wager this movie is a lot stronger than. You can definitely tell Leigh Whannell's scripts were starting to run out of ideas but this point but an extremely likable cast and a handful of cleverly deployed scare sequences makes it worth checking out. [7/10]

Director Report Card: James Wan (2013) - Part Two

6. Insidious: Chapter 2

With the release of “The Conjuring,” James Wan had seemingly started the next chapter of his career. He'd soon be directing big budget blockbusters and have his own production company. However, a matter remained to be resolved. “Insidious” had been a hit, the success that allowed him to make “The Conjuring.” And Blumhouse is in the business of sequels, squeezing all the life out of the “Paranormal Activity” franchise until it was bled dry. Jason Blum insisted he wouldn't make a second “Insidious” without Wan and Leigh Whannall's involvement. Wan himself, expressing some frustration with the way “Saw” progressed without him, didn't want to abandon “Insidious” either. So a simple enough solution was decided on: The director would do both. He jumped over to New Line and started a new horror series with “The Conjuring.” Two months later, “Insidious: Chapter 2” would come out from Blumhouse. I guess being so in-demand that two separate studios want to work with you is probably a sweet deal for a filmmaker. Would it produce compelling cinema though?

Picking up shortly after the end of the first film, the police are questioning Renai Lambert over why the dead body of psychic Elise Rainier was in her house. Naturally, her husband is the prime suspect in the homicide. Renai has started to notice her husband is acting strange too. Josh wants to forget everything strange that happened and get on with their lives, despite the ghostly activity continuing as the family stays in mother-in-law Lorraine's house. Renai is right to be suspicious: When he astral projected into the Further, Josh's soul was left behind and now the spirit of a notorious serial killer is possessing his body. Lorraine and the surviving members of Elise's ghost hunter team attempt to unravel this mystery while Renai does what she can to protect her children from the thing inhabiting her husband's body. Ultimately, Dalton will have to use his abilities to enter the Further to rescue his dad.

The first “Insidious” hinted at the idea that childhood trauma is always revisited on the next generation, that the pain we experience as kids tend to influence what kind of parents we become. The sequel, smartly, foregrounds this idea further. In “Chapter 2,” Josh has now made the full jump from being an abused kid to becoming an abuser himself. He emotionally manipulates his wife and, by the end, is threatening to murder his kids. (Via an extended homage to “The Shining,” the ultimate example of using a ghost story as a metaphor for parental abuse.) Granted, this isn't technically Josh's fault. The ghost possessing him was also shaped and warped by a cartoonishly evil parent. Even in death, his mother's voice compels him to kill. This provides a narrative out for the dad character, preventing “Insidious: Chapter 2” from becoming an especially deep exploration of its theme. At the same time, at least the sequel is willing to follow through on the ideas present in the first one.  

Something I criticized about the first “Insidious” for how goofy and unintimidating I found its antagonists. Smartly, James Wan and Leigh Whannell realized that the Lipstick-Faced Demon was not going to become their next Jigsaw. They instead pivoted to the second most popular ghosts from the first movie, the so-called Bride in Black. (So obviously derivative of Susan Hill's the Woman in Black and a hundred other ghosts throughout folklore.) An elaborate backstory is invented for the briefly glimpsed spectre. The Bride is a crossdressing serial killer, a man named Parker who was forced to live as a girl by his insane mother, prompting him to dress up as a woman when he murdered his victims. That a mainstream horror movie still doing the “murderous transvestite” trope in 2013 was kind of surprising. Wan and Whannall have absolutely no interest in exploring any deeper meaning to this particular cliché. Indeed, the Bride in Black is not developed any further beyond this idea, existing as nothing but a spectral boogeyman/woman to antagonize the family.

While you can certainly question the taste of crafting a back story like this for your cheesy horror movie villain, I do think “Insidious: Chapter 2” did make a good choice in one regard. In the first film, the Lambert family was tormented by a whole host of ghouls with silly names. Aside from the Bride and the Lipstick-Faced Demon, there were the Doll Girl and that Trent Reznor lookalike and probably some others I've already forgotten. None made much of an impression. By centralizing its story around one primary antagonist, “Chapter 2” feels tells a more focused story. Similarly, while the evil spirits of the first “Insidious” had the vague motivation of wanting Dalton's power, “Chapter 2” has a very clear, understandable goal for its baddie. The former murderer wants more life, another life separate from his goading monster of a mother. It all works a lot more smoothly than a Darth Maul lookalike crawling around on the walls. 

I found the mythology the first “Insidious” attempted to weave to be extremely silly, drawing from New Age hokum about astral projection and the spiritual realm. “Chapter 2” doesn't dismiss any of these ideas. If anything, it focuses on them more, the sequel spending far more time in the misty, dark Further. However, Wan and Whannell did cook up some clever ideas with all its ghostly nonsense. It would seem time is nonlinear in the Further, allowing “Insidious: Chapter 2” to revisit the events of the first film and its own prologue from the other side. This creates some genuinely amusing surprises, the sequel folding in own itself and the events of part one. Rather than focus in on the silly stuff about the rules of the spirit realm, “Chapter 2” comes up with interesting narrative swerves of its own.

You can tell that Whannell, cranking out this script around the same time he was probably writing “Cooties” and whatever “The Mule” is, might've had to rush this one. “Insidious: Chapter 2”splits its screen time among two sets of characters for long stretches. We have the plot of the Lamberts, Josh's body being host to an evil spirit while his wife starts to catch on. Running parallel to that is Specs and Tucker from the first film, teaming up with Lorraine and another colleague of the late Elise, investigating the origins of the Bride in Black. The trio of ghost hunters were a high-light of the first film and, one suspects, there was a bit of a pull between wanting to tell the next part of the Lambert's story and give the fans more of these guys. Or, maybe, the production could only afford name actors like Patrick Wilson and Rose Bryne for a few days. Dividing the movie between two separate groups is a little awkward, sometimes leading to “Insidious: Chapter 2” having a lumpy pacing. 

Another issues with this divide in the story is that one of these plots is a lot more compelling than the other. The coolest idea present in the story of the Lamberts is the gruesome inclusion that, as long as an undead spirit is inhabiting Josh's body, it is slowly falling apart. I like that little touch of body horror, of his teeth falling out. However, that plot thread is devoted to Renai trying to discover something we, the audience, is already aware of. Meanwhile, watching a trio of quasi-incompetent ghost hunters stumble around a dusty, cobweb strewn asylum in search of answers is the kind of silly horror theatrics I can get into. The bumbling investigators record some of their search to, drawing direct parallels to the found footage movies “Insidious: Chapter 2” was essentially looking to replace. 

Those scenes, of these hopelessly in-over-their-own-heads guys, rummaging through a spooky old hospital represents “Insidious: Chapter 2” probably at its best. I'm a sucker for classic horror atmosphere. Layering a setting in dust and spider webs already goes a long way towards making me like a movie. A slowly moving rocking horse is far creepier than any of the sequel's pasty-faced ghosts. Unfortunately, that subtly is in short supply here. “Chapter 2” utilizes blaring jump scares more than the original did. The soundtrack shrieks obnoxiously multiple times throughout, the audience always aware of the incoming noise thanks to the film growing suspiciously quiet beforehand. It's a wild abuse of, by far, my least favorite modern horror cliché, not generating scares so much as it leaves my ear drums battered and bruised. 

The constant barrage of deafening scares are hard to take seriously. As is an utterly hilarious sequence, when one of the reoccurring bad ghosts are tossed through a window in one smooth, continuous movement. It's another example of Wan and his team mistaking silly for scary... However, the longer “Insidious: Chapter 2” goes on, the sillier its antics get. The finale involve a frying pan being weaponized and some surprisingly theatrical melee combat. I laughed and I can't help but think I was supposed to. Whether Wan and his team realized the first movie got goofy as shit and knowingly went for camp this time out, or if I simply missed any intentional tongue-in-cheek quality in part one, it's clearly present here. “Insidious: Chapter 2” gets a little silly with it, knowingly so, and is all the better for it.

On account of getting killed off last time, Lin Shaye's Elise has a smaller role in the sequel, her part mostly being assumed by Steve Coulter's Carl. He's a psychic with the gimmick of communicating with the spirit world via die with letters imprinted on them. That's a dynamic idea and Coulter is affable in the part. He ends up as the straight man to Whannell and Angus Sampson, who remain comedic characters. As “Chapter 2” goes on and becomes sillier, you get the impression that the cast is absolutely in on the joke. Patrick Wilson, especially when playing the grimacing serial killer, is happily hamming it up. Danielle Bisutti, as the abusive ghost mother, also abandons all good taste in pursuit of playing a cartoonishly evil figure. These cast members, I do believe, know that they are being funny. That furthers my impression that we are not meant to take this motion picture entirely seriously. 

“Insidious: Chapter 2” has the same cinematographer as “Insidious: Chapter 1,” in the form of John R. Leonetti. It marks the last collaboration between Wan and the esteemed director of “Mortal Kombat: Annihilation,” who was pursuing a directorial career of his own once again. The sequel doesn't look that different from its predecessor. It is often too dark, with more overcast greyness and greenness to its look than I prefer. The last third gets a little shaky too. However, there is a flash of some vibrant reds in one scene, which I appreciate, and a few smooth camera movements that aren't bad. Wan is slowly moving away from the bland visuals of “Saw” and its like, which was hopelessly passé by 2013. 

At the box office, “Insidious: Chapter 2” still made a killing for Blumhouse and the other four production companies with logos before the opening credits. The sequel was made for five times the original's one million dollar budget and grossed 162 million, still providing a profitable return by any measure. Critically, the sequel was overshadowed by Wan's other horror movie with Patrick Wilson in 2013. That's a better movie, so I'm not surprised. However, I do think “Insidious: Chapter 2” is a marginal improvement over the first one, embracing the silliness of its own material while also finding a more consistent antagonist to base its story around. The sequel ends on a much more upbeat note than the original, before an uninspired extra scene is tagged on. This is essentially Wan bringing closure to the story he started in the first one while leaving the door open for further sequels that other directors could take over, suggesting he truly did have some personal attachment to these characters. [Grade: C+]

Director Report Card: James Wan (2010)

4. Insidious

With “Saw,” James Wan had launched the most popular horror franchise of the 2000s. His subsequent motion pictures had failed to duplicate that breakout success. By 2010, the “Saw” series had been bled dry by yearly sequels. Also clipping into the “Saw” installments' box office by this point was “Paranormal Activity,” a new horror franchise cranking out annual movies. Rather than try and beat 'em, Wan decided to join 'em. He teamed up with Oren Peli and Jason Blum, those responsible for the rival series, to create a new horror film. Concerned that the graphic gore of the “Saw” movies had convinced people he only made splatter flicks, Wan and Leigh Whannell's next collaboration would focus on the classical idea of a haunted house. Supposedly made for one and a half million dollars, “Insidious” would gross over one hundred times its budget at the box office. The film's success would further cement Blumhouse as the defining mainstream flavor of horror going into the new decade, launch a series of its own as well as numerous other haunting flicks with descriptive one-word titles, and proved that James Wan wasn't going away any time soon.

The Lambert family has a seemingly happy existence. Josh and Renai have recently moved into a wonderful new home, with their kid in tow: Oldest son Dalton, middle child Foster, and newborn baby Kali.. After an incident in the attic, Dalton falls into a coma that no doctor can explain. This proceeds increasingly frightening paranormal activity, seemingly targeting Renai. The family moves into a new home but the haunting only intensifies. Desperate, Josh and Renai bring in a team of psychic researchers. They believe Dalton has astral projected into an extra-dimensional realm called the Further, attracting the attention of malevolent spirits and a red-faced demon. Dalton is awoken by the team's efforts but the horror is far from over. He inherited his powers from his dad, Josh having a long history with these particular otherworldly entities. 

Wan and Whannell have spoken of their influences over the years, how “The Amityville Horror” and the case files of the Warrens scared the crap out of them as kids. You can see echoes of both of these in “Insidious.” As in “Amityville,” this is the story of a husband and wife with a couple of kids moving into a new house, only to be beset by supernatural terror. As in reality, parapsychologists appear to investigate. Another likely influence was “Poltergeist,” as both this film and that one have the family banding together when one of the children is “taken.” However,  “The Amityville Horror” was as much about the financial pressures that tear the family apart as the paranormal ones. While “Poltergeist” was a story of a family realizing the love they have for each other is more valuable than their Reagan era luxuries. Which raises the question: What is “Insidious” about? 

It's not about money, that much is clear. Renei is a stay-at-home mom, who writes songs in her spare time. Josh is a teacher, somehow able to take care of three kids, a wife, and a new house on that meager salary. When the otherworldly incidents become more than Renei can handle, she demands that the family moves into another house. Which they do, seemingly without any further financial burden being placed on them. We do see the two starting to argue as Dalton's condition remains unchanged and weird shit continues to happen, with Josh staying longer at work seemingly to avoid the problems at home. This amounts to all of one scene though. The couple otherwise seem happily married, loving all three of their kids. “Insidious” seems to resist the traditional subtext of the haunted house genre, in which the disturbance in the home is much more than spiritual.

In that case, what is “Insidious” about? The film's pithy tagline was “It's not the house that's haunted.” This is all but repeated in dialogue. Much as in Peli and Blum's “Paranormal Activity” franchise, it is a person that the unrestful spirits are attached to, not a structure. Josh's mom has photographs of the boy from his youth, a ghostly presence lurking in the background of each. He has totally suppressed and forgotten the childhood horror that apparently haunted him. Despite that, it has returned to infect his son, who is now more at risk than he ever was. When paired with the downbeat ending, “Insidious” becomes a story of how the past is never totally done with us. Josh may have buried his childhood trauma but it has been revived in his own son, much the way a genetic mental illness, the cycle of abuse, or alcoholism reoccurs throughout a family bloodline. 

Whether “Insidious” is knowingly invoking themes of childhood abuse or not, there's definitely one point the film seems to be making: The supernatural is real and only professional ghost hunters can help. Once medium Elise Rainier and her team of parapsychology researchers enter the film, “Insidious” uncritically embraces new age bullshit. Spirit photography is invoked. Rainer's sidekicks, Specs and Tucker, use all sorts of heat and energy detecting gizmos to determine something is amiss. Why they need to do this, when Elise is psychic and can receive visual impressions of these demonic spirits, I don't know. All of this climaxes with the script's embracing of astral projection as a literal fact. I love horror movies and I love folklore. I don't mind any number of goopy, New Age hooey being included in a horror film to build up its own story or ideas. However, considering “Insidious” is a test run for “The Conjuring” – a full-term reputation laundering for a pair of fraudsters and kooks – it's hard to perceive its embracing of ghost hunting hokum and astral plain nonsense as anything but a sincere endorsement. 

This reveals another problem with “Insidious.” It is, in fact, an extremely silly motion picture. James Wan and his team are adapt at the brass tacks techniques of engineering effective scares. The first half of the movie features multiple, quiet and still shots of the family in their home. This establishes a sense of place and, with it, a sense of normality. The mundane first act is devoted to Renei playing with Dalton and the other kids, the couple bonding, and other scenes of domestic tranquility. The film is establishing a “normal” world, one any of us can recognize, that will soon be disrupted and distorted by the horrors to come. Wan is good at this and “Insidious” is genuinely most effective in its earlier scenes, when the creeping sense that something is going to go very wrong, very soon is unavoidable. 

If “Insidious” was Wan's attempt to prove he didn't need the grisly violence of the “Saw” movies to scare an audience, it's a mixed showcase. On one hand, a decent attempt is made to build a creepy ambiance. The ghostly activity starts small, with an alarm going off or a shadowy figures spotted on the wall. Too often, however, these scenes pay off in the loudest and most obnoxious types of shrieking scares imaginable. This is most apparent in one of “Insidious'” trademark sequences. Barbara Hershey as Josh's mom – named Lorraine, another likely nod to the Warrens – relates a nightmare she had that further suggests the demonic spirit at the story's center. It's an effectively spooky moment that builds to a head in bright red and black face paint standing behind Patrick Wilson and roaring like a tiger. That's supposed to be a big scary moment but it comes off as thuddingly loud and rather goofy to me. 

Sadly, that is an omen of things to come. “Insidious” looses a lot of steam after the Lamberts move to a new home, all the work it did establishing a sense of location in the first hour going out the window. At that point, the ghosts stop messing around and start getting in people's faces. A boy dressed like a Dickensian ragamuffin leaps from a closest at Renei. In one utterly hilarious scene, little Dalton springs to life and starts throwing grown men around a room while a stringy-haired goth dude licks people's faces. In its last act, “Insidious” sends Patrick Wilson through a carnival-style house of horrors, the man walking from room to room as he encounters one ghostly tableau after another. All of these spectres utilize well-trotted visual clichés. There's a ghostly bride, people smiling ominously, and a demon with cloven hooves who sharpens his nails like Freddy Krueger. By far the most egregious miscalculation made is trying to mine an old song for post-modern creepiness. Wan chooses Tiny Tim's trilling, ukulele strumming weirdo novelty classic “Tiptoe Through the Tulips.” That's a song I associate with listening to Dr. Demento, not with otherworldly horrors.  

“Insidious” never blinks either, playing all of its goofy attempts at scares with utmost seriousness. The film only grows more humorless as it goes along, fully invested in its own dumb-ass mythology. Rather than simply calling its spirits ghosts or demons, the script quickly starts to throw around its own language. “The Further” is the term it cooks up for the extra-dimensional world its nasty spooks hang out in. When paired with multiple dead-serious monologues about the ominous and evil forces that nearly claimed Josh as a youth, and the powers of hypnosis, you get the feeling that Wan and Whannell thought they were writing the horror version of “Lord of the Rings” or something. Most long running horror series invent a fabulous mythology out of happenstance, the natural extension of running a simple idea out as long as you can. “Insidious” wants that right from the get-go and doesn't have the handling on modern folklore the way, say, “The Blair Witch Project” did.

Perhaps I'm overthinking all of it. James Wan set out to dispel the notion that he was only a gore guy. Obviously, “Insidious'” box office success and the subsequent decade of hits Wan has directed proved that again and again. However, “Insidious” actually has a lot more in common with Wan's breakout film than he'd probably like to admit. John R. Leonetti, his “Dead Silence” and “Death Sentence” cinematographer, returns to photograph this one. It continues the sickly green and washed-out grey color palette that characterizes Wan's work up to this point. In its last act, increasingly frantic camera movements – akin to the shock metal music video style editing that characterized “Saw” – put in a few token appearances. The bloody stumps and mangled bodies have been left behind but the same visual quirks are very much present.

“Insidious'” sense of self-seriousness is present in most of its performances. Patrick Wilson and Rose Bryne do fine in the early scenes, projecting enough warmth for you to buy them as loving parents and a happy couple. However, as the material grows more ridiculous, it becomes more difficult to recognize their behavior as those of human beings. Genre stalwart Lin Shaye appears as Elise and it's nice to see her with a bigger role. She's probably the most adapt member in the cast at making the script's pseudo-scientific trash believable. Leigh Whannell himself and Angus Sampson as her sidekicks contribute a little bit of comic relief, something the film desperately needed more of. 

With a score of skittering ambiance and shrieking strings from Joseph Bishara, “Insidious” set out to be a scary movie for a mass audience. It must have worked, considering the box office receipts and several sequels it generated. I suppose people flocked to the movie, threw their popcorn up into the air, squealed with delight at the jump scares, and left wanting to know more about its belabored backstory. There is technical skill on display in “Insidious” that I can admire. Wan and his teams know the notes to play but they don't seem to have a grip on – if you'll excuse the pun – the spirit of the thing. Not that the majority of people agree with me, as “Insidious” is widely accepted among many as a modern horror classic. I guess, by some measure, ghost movies are preferable to overly slick remakes, floppy found footage flicks, and same-y torture horror. I guess. [Grade: C+]

Director Report Card: Leigh Whannell (2015)

Turns out it's been two years since I actually finished a Director's Report Card, which doesn't make me feel great. In hopes of getting myself back in the groove of things, I decided to throw out a short one. Me deciding to do a Leigh Whannell retrospective, you can probably guess, was originally meant to be part of a longer project also covering James Wan's career... And that is coming soon. The two have been writing partners for years, their paths intertwined. However, with the new “Wolf Man” having just come out, I bumped this one up the schedule. Whannell has carved out a niche for himself free of his buddy, after all. 

1. Insidious: Chapter 3

"Insidious: Chapter 2" would be the last time James Wan had a direct hand in the second popular horror franchise he created. While he seemingly brought the story of the Lambert family to a satisfying close, he knew enough about the business to leave the door – the red one, I suppose – open for a third entry. Rather than abandon the ghostly series to the Darren Lynn Bousmans of the world, Wan would hand his baby off to the series' co-creator and his closest collaborator. Leigh Whannall would make the jump from screenwriter to director with the third installment of the franchise. 

This was a smart move all around. One suspects Whannall was eager to break into directing. The third entry in an already popular series he was already writing seemed like the natural place to test out his abilities behind the camera. If Whannall decided directing wasn't for him, there would be little stopping him from going right back to writing only, right? If it did work out, this would be a relatively low risk place, as far as film sets go, to prove his talents. Blumhouse's standard model of keeping production budgets low and spending more on advertisement, insuring the film makes back its whole budget on opening weekend, is a good way for new directors to test out their ability. This worked out exactly as planned. The studio got another hit and Leigh Whannall successfully launched a directorial career. 

Instead of picking up the sequel hook from the end of "Chapter 2," this "Insidious" is set several years before the events of the original. Teenager Quinn Brenner reaches out to medium Elise Rainier in hopes of contacting her recently deceased mother. Elise, reeling from the suicide of her husband, says she's retired. Shortly afterwards, Quinn is struck by a car and flat lines for several seconds. Afterwards, the girl – stuck in bed with a broken leg – begins to experience strange phenomena in her apartment building. She is seemingly being pursued by a wheezing spirit. The haunting gets bad enough that Quinn's skeptical dad calls in ghost hunters, Specs and Tucker. When Quinn is dragged into the Further, Elise appears to confront the evil spirits after the girl. 

It's become an unavoidable cliché in recent years that no theme has been more explored by the horror genre than grief and trauma. However, considering "Insidious" has always been concerned with spirits from the afterlife, it's a natural theme for this prequel to explore. The central idea here is one of overcoming grief and moving on. Quinn feels stunted by the death of her mother, which her blue collar father seemingly can't confront at all. Elise, meanwhile, has sheltered herself from the world after her husband's suicide. These two are trapped in a cycle of being unable to accept the passing of their loved ones and continue on. Of course, through their traumatic experience, they will both learn that life is still worth living, that our loved ones would want us to keep going. Simple stuff but it's a sturdy thematic foundation to build your spook show upon.

"Insidious: Chapter 3" makes another logical choice for the series. Lin Shaye was certainly a stand-out in the first two installments, the genre veteran bringing a likable presence with her. Elise had shuffled off the mortal coil by the time the second film started but, no matter, simply go a little further back in time. Building the series around a spiritual investigator, who clearly had many other cases before the Lamberts, was obviously the easiest way to keep the "Insidious" train rolling. And if it meant we got more of Lin Shaye's comfy, grandmotherly persona, who could complain? Elise had the standard "coming out of retirement for one last gig" arc, which gives Shaye some decent emotional text to bite into. 

Calling "Insidious: Chapter 3" a "Lin Shaye vehicle" is slightly misleading. She is not truly the star of the film. That would fall to a photogenic young actress, Stefanie Scott. While you never quite know what you'll get from the leads in horror films, Scott is good. Quinn isn't merely defined by her trauma, also having a dream of performing on-stage as an actress. She also has good chemistry with Dermont Mulroney as her dad, a working man who clearly isn't the best at processing emotions. In fact, the cast is surprisingly likeable overall. Tate Berney is amusing as Quinn's hyperactive little brother and I like the amount of attention paid to her friends and crushes. Quinn is more fleshed out than your standard slasher movie final girl. We get a sense of what her life is like, outside these events. 

Which is not to say that "Chapter 3" isn't a standard jump scares delivery machine, that formula which Blumhouse has turned into such a profitable model. The third installment absolutely continues the tradition of hammering the audience with as many loud shrieks as possible. Every ghostly encounter brings with it a sudden noise or a grisly face being thrusted towards the heroine. It's all thoroughly predictable, the audience knowing that a big shock is about the come the minute everything starts to get quiet. The most ridiculous one is saved for the prequel's final moments, in which the franchise's silliest but most famous ghost puts in a cameo. The way the ghosts slide in and out of frame can't help but bring fun house attractions to mind, showing the mechanical devotion the "Insidious" series has to making people squeal. 

However, it must be said, I think Leigh Whannall is actually a little better at delivering this kind of tired old scare than his old buddy, James Wan, is. Part three does not lean on Joseph Bishara's cacophonous score as much as the previous two entries did. Whannall seems to understand that jump scares are a little less obnoxious when not always accompanied by thundering strings on the soundtrack. A sequence involving the central ghoul – played, by the way, by the same guy who was the Mummy in "The Monster Squad" – being tossed out a window, only for our heroine to foolishly look back out, is quite well executed. I would argue that "Chapter 3" utilizes a bit more subtly than is demanded of this type of boo-show. Setting the story almost entirely within a rickety, dilapidated old apartment building is a sensible updating of the gothic cliché of the dust caked Victorian mansion. Most of us probably have much more familiarity with the former than the latter, making this a reasonably modern upgrade to the haunted house premise. 

While hopelessly retrained within the PG-13 limits of this series, Whannell does make an effort to add more variety to the types of scares delivered here. That Quinn spends nearly the entire film with her leg in a heavy cast makes her especially vulnerable. It also draws attention to bodily deformation and pain. This is extended by the villain, an emaciated spectre who is always struggling to breath and garbed in a stained, tattered hospital gown. This reinforces the idea of a dead spirit, desperate to cling to life. This builds towards some decent body horror in the second act. The image of an eye appearing in Quinn's throat – possibly pilfered from "A Nightmare on Elm Street 2" – was bold enough to make one of the posters. Another gag, truly utilizing that leg cast for some good old fashion cringes, is probably the cleverest scare in the movie. Quinn losing her identity is nicely visualized by her eyes disappearing from her face, a gnarly little bit of make-up.

By leaving James Wan – save a cameo as a casting director – the "Insidious" series can also move beyond the traditional visual look he brings with him. Stepping into the role of cinematographer is Brian Pearson, who has previously mostly worked in the realm of television and low budget horror flicks. Pearson, however, does decent work. “Chapter 3” discards the overwhelming greenish grey look of the first two and introduces a little more color into things. Some rich reds suggests a hellish atmosphere, while blues and blacks bringing some classical, spooky Halloween vibes. Overall, Whannell and his team makes good use of lighting and shadows throughout, with stray rays often breaking through into rooms or barely seen beasties lurking in the dark.

As much as “Chapter 3” does its own thing, apart from the first two installments, this is still an “Insidious” movie. By which I mean, it's going to get really stupid before the end. Once we enter the Further in the last act, the expected funhouse atmosphere takes hold. There's a fine layer of mist on the floor. Elise is presented with different creaking spirits, each one like a set piece in a haunt. The previous installment overcame the inherent goofiness of its “pasty faced ghouls leaping out of the dark” set-up by moving more towards intentional camp. “Chapter 3” does this too, when little ol' Lin Shaye cusses out a familiar spirit and punches them out a window. It's hard to deny that the filmmakers know the material is getting silly when they include a comical moment like that.

“Insidious: Chapter 3” could almost be watched apart from the first two entries, taking place before either happen. This represents an origin stories of sorts for Specs and Tucker, explaining how high-tech hucksters like this became associated with a classical medium. Steve Coulter stops by as Carl, Elise's buddy from “Chapter 2,” for one whole scene. There are tedious acknowledgements of the first two films' trademark ghosts, the Bride in Black showing up for a quick scene. None of this stuff adds much to the narrative and is easy to ignore, if slightly puzzling, if somewhere to want to leap right into this one for whatever reason. 

Ultimately, “Insidious: Chapter 3” does not overcome its status as a disposable piece of entertainment, another Blumhouse product they can mark in their yearly earnings' calendar. This film delivers the expected amount of loud scares and creepy apparitions, scientifically designed to make back nearly its entire production budget during opening weekend. (That's exactly what happened too, “Chapter 3” opening with 10 million against a budget of 11 million.) Within this modest framework, however, I do think “Insidious: Chapter 3” manages to be a little better than the films that came before. It's a tiny bit better done in terms of frights and puts a little more work into its characters. Destined to slip away quickly from the memory but amusing enough while you're watching it. Good job, Leigh. [Grade: B-]