Insidious is one of the original scary movies I “watched.” I put watched in quotations, because I recall looking away from the laptop screen for a majority of the film. If I recall correctly, my friends and I watched it on a laptop in my room in seventh grade, or somewhere close to that year. I was too scared to really watch it, so I kept looking away or closing my eyes, but that was not something I admitted to because my friends were watching, and I did not want to appear scared, which is funny now, because I will basically watch anything. In the original, there was this red demon guy, and we all joked that he was Darth Maul, and this worked as a good coping mechanism, and it is something that we can still mention to this day a whole lifetime later. Scary movies help to build those bonds, and now another instalment has been added to the Insidious universe, but sadly I saw this one alone.
The Red Door starts out at a funeral for Loraine, who was Josh’s mom, and she played a role in the first two films. Immediately after the funeral, it is clear that there is some serious family turmoil, and let us be honest, if a family has to go through multiple possessions, it is probably going to hard on them. Josh and Renai have split up, and Josh’s relationship with the kids has slowly slipped after his possession. Dalton is about to go to college, and so in an attempt to rekindle some level of a father son bond, besides the forgotten ability to travel to The Further, Josh offers to drive Dalton to college to help him move into his dorm. Sadly, this results in a massive fight, and Josh storms out.
Dalton is going to school to become an artist, and this is what he is passionate about doing. In class one day, his professor asks the class to close their eyes and look deep within themselves for inspiration and to draw what they saw or felt. While drawing, Dalton is deeply focused, and then a black hand grabs his hand, and this results in a bloody stain being left in the center of Dalton’s piece, which is revealed to be The Red Door, which has now been reopened to The Further. The piece is dark and moody, but it is also beautiful in horrific kind of way. Then Dalton goes on to see more paranormal happenings, and Chris his roommate starts to venture with him to help address the problem.
Dalton is not the only one who starts to see things. Now that the door has been reopened, his dad, Josh, also starts to travel to The Further again. Josh goes to get an MRI, because he has been having trouble with his memory, so he wants to see if there a problem, while getting an MRI, Josh slips into The Further, and someone tries to get him in the MRI machine. Later, when Josh is back home, another ghost comes and scares him, and this leads to him finding information about his dad, who had a similar ability as he did. When Josh goes to talk to Renai about what he has been seeing, she tells him that he used to go to The Further, and that he was hypnotized to forget about this, but now it is back, and Josh and Dalton are both in danger again.
The one part of this movie that I missed the most was an opening scare. Normally in the scary movie formula, the movie opens up with a scare, and then it gets more into the exposition and the actual narrative arc, but this one skips that, and it jumps right into the story, and there is not a scare until about thirty minutes into the film, and this leaves only an hour and ten minutes to jam the scares in before the credits role. Also when the opening and end Insidious title card ran, there was not the same chilling orchestral music. Literally every time it popped up in the first two movies it gave me chills, and it immediately made me feel uncomfortable. The music for this title card was nowhere near as scary.
The opening thirty minutes is a different kind of scary, family trauma, and this theme continues out in a more symbolic way as the story progresses, but initially it is as blunt as the hammer that Josh tried to use to hit his kid with in the second movie. There is tension between Josh and every other member of the family, except for Foster, because just like in the first two, he is largely forgotten. The familial tension is just so awkward to watch, like it feels private, and like it should not be up on the screen. A different kind of cringe inducing than what occurs later in the film. Clearly there has been a lack of communication between Josh and his kids, and when the communication has been there, it has been cold and distant, thus frosting over the bonds that had been strong in previous films. A sad down turn.
This idea of family trauma rolls over. The audience finds out that the main ghost that is haunting Josh is his father. This leads to Josh finding out that his dad was hospitalized in a mental facility, because of the claims he was making, but it turns out that he was just traveling to The Further. This skill was passed down to Josh, and then Josh passed it down to one of his sons, Dalton. So it also brings up the idea of what families pass down to one another whether it is intentionally done or not. In this case, there was no stopping this from being passed down, but it also led to some other trauma as well, that is harder to forget. In the second movie, Josh is possessed by a demon, and he tries to kill his family with a hammer. Although it was not his actions, that is a visual that is hard to get out of one’s head, their father trying to kill them. The visual was wiped from Dalton’s and Josh’s memory, at least temporarily, but Renai and Foster had to deal with this image engrained in their heads, and after that their family dynamic started to tank.
Patrick Wilson, who played Josh in this movie, has really cemented himself as one of the kings of horror movies. He has played a prominent acting role in the Insidious franchise, and he has also played a big role in The Conjuring Universe, two of the most prestigious modern horror franchises, and now he has also added directing to his repertoire. This was the first film that he ever directed, and I think it is safe to say that he did a good job. It is impressive to put up a great acting performance and to also direct the film at the same time. I hope that he continues to help the horror genre thrive.
This movie had a high level of moments where I was actively trying to the character what to do, because it felt like they kept making the wrong choice. It has that stereotypical aspect of the person always seeming to make the wrong choice, like please do not go back to the spot where the scary thing happened, so that you can try to talk to the ghost again, that is not a good idea, and it never is a good idea. Or please do not go under the bed, because the light you had under there went out. It was obviously turned off by something evil, and it does not make sense to try and fix it. Why not run instead and try to save yourself? This just adds to the fun though.
The Insidious franchise is filled with scares, and good ones at that, and they do it all while maintaining a PG-13 rating, which makes it all the more accessible for horror fans. This was another solid entry to the group, and it also provided some solid scares as well, the most memorable of which is probably the MRI scare, but the ones with the throw up were gross too, so that will help them to endure. I will always remember seeing the second Insidious in the theaters as a sophomore in high school with a big group of friends, and it was scary for everyone, but I specifically remember Ethan, because he was mauling me, and he was kicking the chair in front of them, and it was great! This one provided the same amount of thrill, it was just missing the added bonus of being scared with friends, but there were plenty of other strangers in the theater to be scared with as well. I give this movie 3.5 Stars, which is higher than its average on other websites, but I really enjoyed myself, so I have no regrets!
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