Insidious is the new horror film by the two people behind the original Saw film, James Wan and Leigh Whannell. Again it’s a low budget film but it pretty far from the torture porn image of the Saw films, instead relying on the old Haunted House/Ghostly goings on routine. Seems to be an attempt to go back to a more traditional horror, rather than the more gory faire we see lately.

The film starts on a series of what look like still black and white photos, though often there’s something moving or out of place in the image, along with screeching music to unsettle you as the titles roll, then a sudden loud sting in the score as the name INSIDIOUS comes up on screen, and this basically sets the tone for the movie. Lots of loud stings and screeching to make you jump and unsettle you.

Then we move in to the film proper and are introduced to a couple, Renai and Josh, along with their 3 young children, Dalton, Foster and Calli, who’ve recently moved in to their new home. Renai wakes early and goes to start unpacking, moving some books from a box to the book shelf she finds an old family photo album and starts looking through as Dalton comes downstairs, unable to sleep either, he doesn’t like his new room, they both sit looking at some photos while the others sleep. Later, after everyone is awake, Renai quickly goes in to the living room to find the books on the floor and she tells Dalton that if he’s going to look at the books he has to put them back, but he says he hasn’t touched them. After Josh has gone to work and the kids have gone to school Renai hears banging coming from upstairs, she goes to investigate and finds nothing, so goes up to the attic, and again finds nothing apart from a broken ladder and a pilot light burning. That evening as the family sit together talking and laughing Dalton sits on his own playing and the attic door swings open so he goes to investigate, climbing the ladder to turn on the light one of the rungs snaps and he falls and hurts himself, then appears to see something and screams. Renai and Josh rush to help him but he appears mostly unharmed, hurt leg, scraped face.

The next morning when Josh goes to wake Dalton he won’t wake up and we skip to a few days later, the hospital have done tests but can’t find a reason for him to be in a coma, he’s just isn’t going through his usual sleep/wake cycle and there’s no reason for it. 3 months later and Dalton is still in a coma and they’re taking care of him at home. Foster asks if he can move rooms because Dalton scares him in the night when he gets up to walk about, and then Renai begins to see things around the home, someone staring through the baby’s window, someone walking on the balcony outside her bedroom window, someone whispering on the baby monitor, and starts to believe the house is haunted.

So far it’s all the standard haunted house stuff, and to be honest there’s not really anything original here. There’s a few jumpy scenes here, but most rely on the loud music to scare you. Yes there’s some creepy images but it relies too heavily on shouting boo! at you. There’s a very heavy element of Poltergeist here, between the medium who comes in later to help, the fact they have to save a child from another place and the haunting following them even after the leave the house. There also seems a little push in to the ridiculous with the paranormal investigators who show up with the medium.

Patrick Wilson as Josh seems pretty wooden and doesn’t really do a good job, Rose Byrne as Renai does a better job but really she’s not fantastic she just does passably well. There’s no brilliant acting on display here but it just about works for the film.

At times the music just about sets your teeth on edge, and the loud stings when anything creepy happens do the job of making you jump, so I suppose it does its job, but I wouldn’t really like to listen to the music on its own, so nothing really interesting there. But it really is a step back towards classic horror rather than gore and wincing you get from a lot of recent films, so I’m inclined to like it much more than most modern horror films. So nothing fantastic but a fairly decent horror film.