(Another reason not to have kids: so no demons can latch onto them and make your life a living hell…)
CAST: Patrick Wilson, Rose Byrne, Lin Shaye, Ty Simpkins, Andrew Astor, Leigh Whannell, Barbare Hershey, Angus Sampson.
DIRECTOR: James Wan
WARNING: Some SPOILERS and some really fucked-up ways to do red-eyes - straight ahead….
IT’S LIKE THIS: All-American married couple Josh and Renai Lambert (Patrick Wilson and Rose Byrne) move into a nice bungalow, only to have their son Dalton (Ty Simpkins) slip into a mysterious coma soon after. Then really bizarre shit starts to happen like voices on the baby monitor and the burglar alarm going off for no reason. Renai gets it into her head that the house is haunted and is the reason why Dalton is in the coma - and wants to get the fuck outta there ASAP. Josh reluctantly agrees to move, trying to suppress the urge to tell his wife that she’s batshit-crazy. Easier to just make her happy, you know? But not long after moving into their new house (get ready for this) the bizarre shit starts to happen at an even greater level. Please try to contain your laughter. Oh, who am I kidding. Laugh your asses off. I did.
THE DUDE (OR DUDETTE) MOST LIKELY TO SAVE THE DAY: Elise Rainier (Lin Shaye), paranormal investigator, and her Bill-and-Ted assistants (Leigh Whannel, Angus Sampson) who might be more, uh, insidious than the ghosts themselves.
EYE CANDY MOST LIKELY TO FIRE UP A WOODY: Patrick Wilson, who looks like one of those Jehovah Witnesses that you just want to corrupt six ways from Sunday. Rose Byrne is a close second. If these two were my parents, I’d be a supermodel right now…
MOST INTENTIONALLY SCARY SCENE: The demon popping up behind Josh in the dining room and scaring the crap out of his mom (Barbara Hershey).
MOST UNINTENTIONALLY SCARY SCENE: Those two dipshit assistants bickering. And bickering. And bickering. And bickering. Ghosts, please kill them already?
HOTTEST SCENE: Because this is a horror flick focused on a family under siege from demons, there’s a real dearth of skin. But we at least have a shot of Patrick Wilson in his boxers. Nice thighs on that man.
INQUIRING MINDS WANT TO KNOW: What exactly is going on in the Lambert household? What did Dalton see in the attic that made him slip into the coma? Why did the “haunting“ follow the Lamberts to their new house? What does Josh‘s mom know that might help them all? What does Elise mean when she says: “it‘s not the house that‘s haunted - it‘s your son“?. Who is Patrick Wilson’s masseuse so I can bushwhack him and take his place at the next appointment?
WHY YOU SHOULD WATCH “INSIDIOUS”: If you like scary movies that are actually, you know, scary. And if you would drink Patrick Wilson and/or Rode Byrne’s bath water.
WHY YOU MAY NOT ENJOY “INSIDIOUS”: If you hate horror flicks or have weak bowels. If the latter is the case, there’s always Depends Undergarments.
FINAL ANALYSIS: Taking the creaky “family moves into a house that turns out to be haunted” formula - then turning the whole thing onto its head, INSIDIOUS is a clever and truly frightening horror film that taps into our primal fears of the dark, the unseen, and the unknown. The ultimate explanation behind the haunting of Dalton is truly an original one. To my recollection, it’s not been used before. You have to give credit to director James Wan and writer Leigh Whannel for not only coming up with something new for a horror flick, but also executing it in such a way that is genuinely scary and unsettling. This is something remarkable, considering how much I detest the SAW films which these two guys are responsible for. INSIDIOUS is a more classical horror film that relies less of exploitative gore, and more on atmosphere, dread, and suspense.
The cast is also instrumental in making us care for the Lamberts and their crisis. Patrick Wilson and Rose Byrne make for a very believable (and very attractive) married couple. With just a few well-placed strokes, Wan and Whannel vividly illustrate their humanity and instantly puts us on their side. Same goes for the child characters played by Ty Simpkins and Andrew Astor. As for the trio of “Ghostbusters” who come to the rescue, Lin Shaye fares the best because of the dead serious manner in which her character approaches the task at hand. The other two played by Whannel and Angus Sampson are less likable, and seem more like sarcastic stereotypes from a teen comedy. They don’t really register as characters. I know Whannel and Wan were probably going for some comic relief with these two, but it represents the only part of INSIDIOUS that doesn’t really click.
In the end, though, INSIDIOUS gets everything else right. This is apparent in its box-office take: it has developed “legs” in the weeks since its release, and looks on course to out-perform that much higher-profiled SCREAM 4. Sometimes, audiences know a good thing when they see it…
