Insidious 2

Posted in movies by - October 16, 2013
Insidious 2

‘Insidious’ was kind of a cool mid-budget horror movie. Sure, it had a lot of rote jump scares (who’s that in the mirror, creepy paranormal kids, general noisy poltergeistery). The thing is, in acts 2 and 3, it got pleasantly retro-nuts.

There was an astral projection subplot, and it played out with early Doctor Who-level production values. I found myself really enjoying the approach. Not only did it introduce some authentic, earned creepiness, but it actually carved out its own space in the genre a bit. Original ideas are in pretty short supply in studio horror pics, so I went home pretty jazzed.

Thing is, I didn’t really think it needed a sequel and nothing in the sequel changed my mind. The story is a little more buttoned-up this time, and some of the more bizarre loose ends from the original make a little more sense now. That’s great, but it’s basically the same movie as its progenitor with what seems to be a slightly bigger budget.

The creepy kids, the restive ghosts, and the dry-icey spirit world are all back and most of the same stuff happens with them.

That said, the ‘Insidious’ franchise (are you a franchise after one sequel?) at least attempted to make its own lane, and even a mostly repetitive follow-up is better than most of the paint-by-numbers torture porn masquerading as scary movies these days.

Confidential to Hollywood: Enough with the PG-13 horror movies. Stupid on so many, many levels. If you’re gonna build a haunted house, you can’t put a sign in the yard that says ‘it’s cool. it feels like brains but it’s just macaroni’.

This post was written by MisterDee

Leave Your Comment