Insidious: Chapter 2 (2013)

James Wan’s original Insidious film was one of the first movies I reviewed back when I started this blog in 2011. I was relatively warm towards it, calling it fun, old-fashioned and a thrilling “haunted house”-esque ride. Looking back at this review, I wrote with less excitement for the movie than I probably even knew I had. Insidious is one of the most remarkably manipulative suspense films of recent years. I say this with the experience of having watched most of the ones that have been released in the past few years and Insidious is the only example of the fast-growing genre that scared me. None of the others even came close. It was a movie that I enjoyed, but couldn’t but snicker at afterwards due to its more out-there moments (the gas mask séance, the demon sewing and listening to “Tiptoe through the Tulips”). Somehow, whether the movie truly deserves it or not, it stuck with me. Its images haunted me in ways few horror pictures ever have and there were moments that filled me with a terrific dread that hasn’t been duplicated.

I saw Wan’s directorial follow-up, The Conjuring, earlier this year with an anticipation that didn’t mar my original viewing of Insidious. Looking at my review of that movie, I was more positive by default even though I consider it the lesser of the two (It was still a fun flick. It must mean something that I again used the terms “haunted house” and old-fashioned thrill ride.), because I was seeing it through the eyes of Insidious’ success. Now we have been granted a sequel to this movie I’ve come to enjoy so much, and I guess I watched it in a less tolerant mood than The Conjuring.

All the expected ingredients have been mixed into Insidious: Chapter 2. Patrick Wilson and Rose Byrne return alongside most of their original co-stars (Even a few dead characters make comebacks.) and you couldn’t ask for better low-budget stars. The movie picks up right where the other one left off, so I won’t go into details lest I spoil the original’s final revelations, suffice to say that someone is not who they seem to be and lots of creepy things are bound to happen.

The biggest problem that I have with Chapter 2 is that Insidious was so tidy and finite. Everything in the sequel works in its own way, but must make a constantly struggling effort to tie its plot in with the one of the last movie. This leads to some sequences that are more ridiculous than they might have been if we were in a new haunted house movie starting from scratch (If you too thought the gas mask was out there, wait until you see the ghosts time-travel.). It is also a shame that the initial jarring impact that the original had and the spontaneity it naturally sported throughout simply can’t be accessed again. As such, everything in the sequel feels strangely forced and I was never fully pulled into its universe.

We are now too aware of the formula: girl walks into room, sees ghostly woman out of the corner of her eye, hears singing on the baby monitor, runs upstairs, nobody’s there but a crying baby, the piano starts playing downstairs, she runs back, nobody’s there again and then the ghost woman suddenly appears right in front of the camera and screams while the score thuds away. There is a bit too much of running in and out of rooms and perhaps not enough satisfying reason as to why spooky things are happening to begin with.

As always, I am forced to be lenient on horror movies because they try so hard and require so little to be successful. Insidious: Chapter 2 is no exception. It’s no masterpiece. It won’t leave you afraid of the dark, but it may startle you enough to warrant the purchase of a ticket. I admit that I didn’t expect anything more than what I got, so what’s the use in nitpicking? 

6/10