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Ross (3282 KP) rated Insidious: Chapter 2 (2013) in Movies
Nov 28, 2017
This follow on film stays with the family after the events of the first film left the family reunited but with something decidedly not right about Josh, the father (played by The Conjuring's Patrick Wilson, who I really can't take to).
Everything seems to get back to normal for a short time with the family reunited and moving on from the trauma they've been through. But this doesn't last long and soon strange things start happening again, this time focused around the baby.
For me, this film fell down a little as many horror sequels do, trying to build on tiny parts of the original story rather than carrying on from it. I found the parts where the reality and past of the presence that haunted Josh in his childhood really engaging and exciting and creepy, but felt this should have been explored so much more.
Rose Byrne is good again, somehow keeping the family together through all the unpleasantness.
One thing that did spoil this for me was when, after a particularly creepy scene in which a ghost child's foot steps were heard running through the house, my 3 year old son decided to get up and run through to my bedroom so I suddenly heard footsteps eerily similar to those on the film directly above my head.
A decent follow on with some interesting exploration of small aspects of the first film, but largely more of the same.
Everything seems to get back to normal for a short time with the family reunited and moving on from the trauma they've been through. But this doesn't last long and soon strange things start happening again, this time focused around the baby.
For me, this film fell down a little as many horror sequels do, trying to build on tiny parts of the original story rather than carrying on from it. I found the parts where the reality and past of the presence that haunted Josh in his childhood really engaging and exciting and creepy, but felt this should have been explored so much more.
Rose Byrne is good again, somehow keeping the family together through all the unpleasantness.
One thing that did spoil this for me was when, after a particularly creepy scene in which a ghost child's foot steps were heard running through the house, my 3 year old son decided to get up and run through to my bedroom so I suddenly heard footsteps eerily similar to those on the film directly above my head.
A decent follow on with some interesting exploration of small aspects of the first film, but largely more of the same.
Acanthea Grimscythe (300 KP) rated Insidious (2010) in Movies
May 12, 2018
I finally have access to all the Insidious films. Because of this, I’m in the process of re-watching the first two – something I haven’t done since their initial release. I watched the first of the films yesterday and my thoughts are a bit mixed on it. Don’t get me wrong – I like the movie, but I think it’s PG-13 rating held it back a bit.
Dalton (Ty Simpkins) is, undoubtedly, the central figure of the story. His role throughout much of the movie is to lay comatose in a bed whilst demons fight for possession of his body. He’s got two siblings, a brother named Foster (I think I got that right) and a sister named Cali. His parents, Renai (Rose Byrne) and Josh (Patrick Wilson) are the supposed doting parents – Josh on the other hand could benefit from an actor that’s a bit more invested in his role. I could feel him rolling his eyes between scenes, he was so unenthused.
The plot of Insidious is fairly straightforward, though there is at least one glaring continuity issue that we encounter. For the most part it’s pretty standard haunting and possession, but somehow halfway through the movie (okay, maybe a little later than that) two characters vanish completely. Foster and Cali, the entire time we’re dealing with the Further – another plane of existence – are nowhere to be found. No one’s worried about their safety, no one’s trying to protect them. They’re just… gone. Unless I missed something critical in which they were sent off to a friend’s house or something, then we’ve got a glaring plot hole that gives this film a bit of a blemish when it comes to its polish.
PG-13 is the rating given to a horror film whose goal is to make money. The whole reason it doesn’t cross that boundary is so that all the teenagers can go to the theatre without their parents for what they hope will be a good scare. I learned this the hard way when I had to walk out of the Prom Night remake because kids wouldn’t shut up. (As a result, I rarely go to see a movie that is PG-13.) In Insidious we see the affects of this in the severity of the “hauntings.” Even the demons are downplayed – there’s a distinct lack of violence in the film that one might expect when a powerful entity is trying to take hold of a kid’s body. Sure, we’ve got a few bloody handprints, a little bit of poltergeist-like activity, but that’s it. It’s most stuff you’d expect to see in a scary movie directed at children, with the addition of a few jump-scares that rely heavily on auditory senses.
Needless to say, there are far worse movies than Insidious out there and I still intend to watch the other films. I’m a bit indecisive on how I want to rate this – I enjoyed watching it up until things get a bit silly toward the end, where the Further is involved. At the same time, I don’t dislike the movie. That said, I’ve decided to go with a three out of five.
Dalton (Ty Simpkins) is, undoubtedly, the central figure of the story. His role throughout much of the movie is to lay comatose in a bed whilst demons fight for possession of his body. He’s got two siblings, a brother named Foster (I think I got that right) and a sister named Cali. His parents, Renai (Rose Byrne) and Josh (Patrick Wilson) are the supposed doting parents – Josh on the other hand could benefit from an actor that’s a bit more invested in his role. I could feel him rolling his eyes between scenes, he was so unenthused.
The plot of Insidious is fairly straightforward, though there is at least one glaring continuity issue that we encounter. For the most part it’s pretty standard haunting and possession, but somehow halfway through the movie (okay, maybe a little later than that) two characters vanish completely. Foster and Cali, the entire time we’re dealing with the Further – another plane of existence – are nowhere to be found. No one’s worried about their safety, no one’s trying to protect them. They’re just… gone. Unless I missed something critical in which they were sent off to a friend’s house or something, then we’ve got a glaring plot hole that gives this film a bit of a blemish when it comes to its polish.
PG-13 is the rating given to a horror film whose goal is to make money. The whole reason it doesn’t cross that boundary is so that all the teenagers can go to the theatre without their parents for what they hope will be a good scare. I learned this the hard way when I had to walk out of the Prom Night remake because kids wouldn’t shut up. (As a result, I rarely go to see a movie that is PG-13.) In Insidious we see the affects of this in the severity of the “hauntings.” Even the demons are downplayed – there’s a distinct lack of violence in the film that one might expect when a powerful entity is trying to take hold of a kid’s body. Sure, we’ve got a few bloody handprints, a little bit of poltergeist-like activity, but that’s it. It’s most stuff you’d expect to see in a scary movie directed at children, with the addition of a few jump-scares that rely heavily on auditory senses.
Needless to say, there are far worse movies than Insidious out there and I still intend to watch the other films. I’m a bit indecisive on how I want to rate this – I enjoyed watching it up until things get a bit silly toward the end, where the Further is involved. At the same time, I don’t dislike the movie. That said, I’ve decided to go with a three out of five.
Ross (3282 KP) rated Insidious: Chapter 3 (2015) in Movies
Dec 4, 2017
No attempt to explain the background of ... anyone really (1 more)
No Rose Byrne
"Chapter 3" is a prequel to the first 2 Insidious films and follows a young girl, Quinn attempting to contact her dead mother, who eventually calls in the help of Elise Rainier (a former psychic who since her husband passed away has become a weird cat lady, played by the weird dog lady from There's Something About Mary), a key character of the first 2 films.
Quinn thinks her mother is attempting to respond to her and wants help breaking through, but after she is hit by a car, breaking both legs, she starts to realise it isn't her mother trying to contact her.
The demon in the film clearly has a backstory (tar footprints, breathing apparatus in his mouth, hospital gown) but there is no attempt to explain this at all. One of the best bits of the second film was the exposition of the demon haunting Josh his whole life and what he had been in life. That is completely absent here. Fan theories abound on the internet but these all seem like nonsense and clutching at straws.
This in itself is a half-decent horror film, there is enough atmosphere and the acting is (in places) decent, but for me was quite a disappointment based on the first film (and to a lesser extent the second chapter). It just be me being grumpy having paid for this film (despite having Sky Cinema, Netflix and Amazon Prime) and didn't feel like I got my £3.49 worth, but I felt a little disappointed at the end.
There was an annoying little teaser at the end of the film where the main demon from the first film appears. This was a bit "Prometheus" as it kind of felt like a prequel but didn't really make sense, and Elise seeing this demon should have meant she was expecting it in the first movie, which didn't quite sit right.
There was a similar teaser at the end of the second film which bore no relation to this film, so plenty of pressure on 2018's conclusion to tie up the loose ends!
Quinn thinks her mother is attempting to respond to her and wants help breaking through, but after she is hit by a car, breaking both legs, she starts to realise it isn't her mother trying to contact her.
The demon in the film clearly has a backstory (tar footprints, breathing apparatus in his mouth, hospital gown) but there is no attempt to explain this at all. One of the best bits of the second film was the exposition of the demon haunting Josh his whole life and what he had been in life. That is completely absent here. Fan theories abound on the internet but these all seem like nonsense and clutching at straws.
This in itself is a half-decent horror film, there is enough atmosphere and the acting is (in places) decent, but for me was quite a disappointment based on the first film (and to a lesser extent the second chapter). It just be me being grumpy having paid for this film (despite having Sky Cinema, Netflix and Amazon Prime) and didn't feel like I got my £3.49 worth, but I felt a little disappointed at the end.
There was an annoying little teaser at the end of the film where the main demon from the first film appears. This was a bit "Prometheus" as it kind of felt like a prequel but didn't really make sense, and Elise seeing this demon should have meant she was expecting it in the first movie, which didn't quite sit right.
There was a similar teaser at the end of the second film which bore no relation to this film, so plenty of pressure on 2018's conclusion to tie up the loose ends!
Bob Mann (459 KP) rated Get Out (2017) in Movies
Sep 29, 2021
“It really doesn’t matter if you’re ‘Black or White”.
Due to a mixture of holiday, work commitments and sickness (I would not wish to inflict my bronchial cough on ANY cinema audience for a while) I haven’t been to the cinema in over a month… shocking. But it has given me a chance to catch up on some of the films in 2017 (and a few from last year) that I hadn’t got to see. So this will be the first of a series of such “DVD” reviews.
“Get Out” was written and directed by Jordan Peele and was his directorial debut. And a hot item on his resume it is too.
Daniel Kaluuya (“Sicario”) plays African-American Chris Washington who, nervously, takes a trip ‘upstate’ to meet the parents of his cute white girlfriend Rose (Allison Williams). The parents, Dean (Bradley Whitford, best known as Josh Lyman from “The West Wing”) and Missy (Catherine Keener, “ Captain Phillips”), are extremely welcoming.
But the weekend coincides with an “annual gathering” of family and friends, and events quickly take a left turn into “The Twilight Zone”, with anti-smoking hypnosis and a bizarre game of Bingo where the win is so substantial that playing becomes a ‘no brainer’. Can Chris ‘Get Out’, with his mind still intact, before it’s too late?
This is a really clever script by Peele. The film baits you into thinking this is some redneck-inter-racial-revenge flick, but actually the colour of the skin is almost irrelevant. (Or is it? This angle is left deliciously vague). Some of the filming is spectacularly creepy, with the hypnosis scene being reminiscent to me of the excellent “Under The Skin”. And never has a teaspoon in a cup of tea been a more devastating weapon.
I seemed to have talked at length this year in this blog on the subject of the “physics of horror”: the story elements hanging together in a satisfying – albeit sometimes in an unbelievable – way. “Get Out” delivers this to perfection, keeping its powder dry until the closing moments of the film before delivering a series of satisfying “Ah!” relevatory moments.
While the ‘physics’ of the film is good the ‘biology’ is bonkers, featuring a plot point from the terrible first episode of the 3rd season of the original “Star Trek” (if you can be bothered to look that up!). But I’ll forgive this, parking my incredulity, to salute what I think is one of the year’s most novel and impressive low-budget indie horror films.
“Get Out” was written and directed by Jordan Peele and was his directorial debut. And a hot item on his resume it is too.
Daniel Kaluuya (“Sicario”) plays African-American Chris Washington who, nervously, takes a trip ‘upstate’ to meet the parents of his cute white girlfriend Rose (Allison Williams). The parents, Dean (Bradley Whitford, best known as Josh Lyman from “The West Wing”) and Missy (Catherine Keener, “ Captain Phillips”), are extremely welcoming.
But the weekend coincides with an “annual gathering” of family and friends, and events quickly take a left turn into “The Twilight Zone”, with anti-smoking hypnosis and a bizarre game of Bingo where the win is so substantial that playing becomes a ‘no brainer’. Can Chris ‘Get Out’, with his mind still intact, before it’s too late?
This is a really clever script by Peele. The film baits you into thinking this is some redneck-inter-racial-revenge flick, but actually the colour of the skin is almost irrelevant. (Or is it? This angle is left deliciously vague). Some of the filming is spectacularly creepy, with the hypnosis scene being reminiscent to me of the excellent “Under The Skin”. And never has a teaspoon in a cup of tea been a more devastating weapon.
I seemed to have talked at length this year in this blog on the subject of the “physics of horror”: the story elements hanging together in a satisfying – albeit sometimes in an unbelievable – way. “Get Out” delivers this to perfection, keeping its powder dry until the closing moments of the film before delivering a series of satisfying “Ah!” relevatory moments.
While the ‘physics’ of the film is good the ‘biology’ is bonkers, featuring a plot point from the terrible first episode of the 3rd season of the original “Star Trek” (if you can be bothered to look that up!). But I’ll forgive this, parking my incredulity, to salute what I think is one of the year’s most novel and impressive low-budget indie horror films.
Bob Mann (459 KP) rated Bad Times at the El Royale (2018) in Movies
Sep 28, 2021
Why is everyone not raving about this movie?
Imagine a ménage à trois of Agatha Christie, Alfred Hitchcock and Quentin Tarantino at the Overlook Hotel with a banging 60’s soundtrack. Got that unpleasant vision in your mind? Good! You’re halfway there to getting the feel of “Bad Times at the El Royale”. And they really are bad times!
The Plot
It’s 1969 and an oddball set of characters arrive at the faded glory of the El Royale hotel at Lake Tahoe: “a bi-state establishment” straddling the Nevada/California border: so describes the manager-cum-bellhop-cum-bartender-cum-cleaner Miles Miller (Lewis Pullman, soon to appear as Maverick in the “Top Gun” sequel). The motley crew include Laramie Seymour Sullivan, a vacuum cleaner salesman (Jon Hamm); Father Daniel Flynn, an oddly-acting priest (Jeff Bridges); Darlene Sweet, a struggling Motown-style singer (Cynthia Erivo); and Emily Summerspring, a rude and abrupt hippy-chick with attitude (Dakota Johnson). But noone is quite who they seem and their twisted and convoluted lives combine in a memorable night of surprise and violence at the El Royale.
The turns
I’ve often expressed my admiration for the Screen Actor’s Guild Awards and their category of “Best Ensemble Cast”: at a time when there are controversial suggestions of additions to the Oscars, this is one I would like to see (along with a “Best Stunt Team” award that I’ve previously lobbied for). And here is my second serious candidate for the “Best Ensemble Cast” Oscar in 2018, my first being “Three Billboards in Ebbing, Missouri” (which in their books would count as 2017 anyway!) Everyone really works hard on this film and the larger than life characters suck you into the story because of the quality and intensity of their performances.
Out in front of the pack are the simply brilliant Jeff Bridges and Cynthia Erivo, an actress new to me who has a great voice and made a big impression. Scenes between the pair are just electric. Jon Hamm is as quirkily great as ever and Dakota “not Fanning” Johnson is far better in this film than any recent stuff I’ve seen her in. Another standout was another newcomer to me – young Cailee Spaeny as Rose, looking for all the world in some scenes like a young Carey Mulligan. While we’re on lookalikes, Lewis Pullman (best known to me for “Battle of the Sexes“) looks very like Tom Holland in some scenes.
The Review
I found this film to be just enormously entertaining. It is very Tarantino-esque in its claustrophobic nature (compare it with “The Hateful 8” in that respect) and with its quirky episodic flash cards (compare with “Pulp Fiction” or “Kill Bill”) but for me was much more appetising since – although very violent – it never stooped to the queasy “blow your face off” excesses of Tarantino, that I personally find distasteful. Where it apes Hitchcock is in its intricate plotting: the story regularly throws you off-balance with some genuinely surprising twists and turns that you never see coming. And the interesting time-splicing and flashbacks also keep you on your mental toes. To say any more or to give any examples would be a spoilerish crime, so I will refrain. This is a dish best served cold (so avoid the trailer if you can).
The film has a marvellous sense of place and time and key to establishing that is some superb set design; some brilliant costumes; and – most of all – an exquisitely chosen song catalogue. The great Michael Giacchino is behind the music, and he does a truly fabulous job, not just with the song selection but also with the background music. This never seems to intrude noticeably until the end titles, when you realise it’s been insistently working on you all the time: the best sort of soundtrack.
There are some films that make you marvel how someone sat at a keyboard and got a screenplay down on paper so satisfyingly. While it could be accused of aping Tarantino somewhat, for me this is still one such film. The writer/director Drew Goddard has come from the J.J. Abrams stable of “Alias” and “Lost”, and has previously written the great screenplays for films including “Cloverfield”, “The Martian” and “World War Z“. His only previous directorial feature was “The Cabin in the Woods” (which I’ve not seen), but after this he is definitely on my movie radar: his next film will be “X-force”: a “Deadpool 2” follow-on with Ryan Reynolds, Josh Brolin and Zazie Beetz, and I can’t wait to see that.
If there’s a criticism it’s that at 141 minutes its a tad long. It never to me felt like a film that long, such was the entertainment value, but while I just loved the development of character just a few of the scenes felt a little leisurely and superfluous. Trim 10 minutes off the running time – no more – and it might have felt tighter still.
I didn’t mention one star name in “The Turns” section, and that’s Chris Hemsworth. He actually does a great job in his demanding Messianic role of Billy Lee, but I just had trouble equating the “Thor” star as being “all kinds of bad”: this felt like a slight misstep in the casting to me.
Summary
This film is without a doubt going to storm into my Top 10 for the year. It’s an entertaining delight, full of twists, turns, deliciously wordy dialogue and a satisfyingly open ending. I can’t believe this film hasn’t been top billing in multiplexes up and down the country for WEEKS on end. If you get the chance, my advice would be to seek this out before it disappears.
The Plot
It’s 1969 and an oddball set of characters arrive at the faded glory of the El Royale hotel at Lake Tahoe: “a bi-state establishment” straddling the Nevada/California border: so describes the manager-cum-bellhop-cum-bartender-cum-cleaner Miles Miller (Lewis Pullman, soon to appear as Maverick in the “Top Gun” sequel). The motley crew include Laramie Seymour Sullivan, a vacuum cleaner salesman (Jon Hamm); Father Daniel Flynn, an oddly-acting priest (Jeff Bridges); Darlene Sweet, a struggling Motown-style singer (Cynthia Erivo); and Emily Summerspring, a rude and abrupt hippy-chick with attitude (Dakota Johnson). But noone is quite who they seem and their twisted and convoluted lives combine in a memorable night of surprise and violence at the El Royale.
The turns
I’ve often expressed my admiration for the Screen Actor’s Guild Awards and their category of “Best Ensemble Cast”: at a time when there are controversial suggestions of additions to the Oscars, this is one I would like to see (along with a “Best Stunt Team” award that I’ve previously lobbied for). And here is my second serious candidate for the “Best Ensemble Cast” Oscar in 2018, my first being “Three Billboards in Ebbing, Missouri” (which in their books would count as 2017 anyway!) Everyone really works hard on this film and the larger than life characters suck you into the story because of the quality and intensity of their performances.
Out in front of the pack are the simply brilliant Jeff Bridges and Cynthia Erivo, an actress new to me who has a great voice and made a big impression. Scenes between the pair are just electric. Jon Hamm is as quirkily great as ever and Dakota “not Fanning” Johnson is far better in this film than any recent stuff I’ve seen her in. Another standout was another newcomer to me – young Cailee Spaeny as Rose, looking for all the world in some scenes like a young Carey Mulligan. While we’re on lookalikes, Lewis Pullman (best known to me for “Battle of the Sexes“) looks very like Tom Holland in some scenes.
The Review
I found this film to be just enormously entertaining. It is very Tarantino-esque in its claustrophobic nature (compare it with “The Hateful 8” in that respect) and with its quirky episodic flash cards (compare with “Pulp Fiction” or “Kill Bill”) but for me was much more appetising since – although very violent – it never stooped to the queasy “blow your face off” excesses of Tarantino, that I personally find distasteful. Where it apes Hitchcock is in its intricate plotting: the story regularly throws you off-balance with some genuinely surprising twists and turns that you never see coming. And the interesting time-splicing and flashbacks also keep you on your mental toes. To say any more or to give any examples would be a spoilerish crime, so I will refrain. This is a dish best served cold (so avoid the trailer if you can).
The film has a marvellous sense of place and time and key to establishing that is some superb set design; some brilliant costumes; and – most of all – an exquisitely chosen song catalogue. The great Michael Giacchino is behind the music, and he does a truly fabulous job, not just with the song selection but also with the background music. This never seems to intrude noticeably until the end titles, when you realise it’s been insistently working on you all the time: the best sort of soundtrack.
There are some films that make you marvel how someone sat at a keyboard and got a screenplay down on paper so satisfyingly. While it could be accused of aping Tarantino somewhat, for me this is still one such film. The writer/director Drew Goddard has come from the J.J. Abrams stable of “Alias” and “Lost”, and has previously written the great screenplays for films including “Cloverfield”, “The Martian” and “World War Z“. His only previous directorial feature was “The Cabin in the Woods” (which I’ve not seen), but after this he is definitely on my movie radar: his next film will be “X-force”: a “Deadpool 2” follow-on with Ryan Reynolds, Josh Brolin and Zazie Beetz, and I can’t wait to see that.
If there’s a criticism it’s that at 141 minutes its a tad long. It never to me felt like a film that long, such was the entertainment value, but while I just loved the development of character just a few of the scenes felt a little leisurely and superfluous. Trim 10 minutes off the running time – no more – and it might have felt tighter still.
I didn’t mention one star name in “The Turns” section, and that’s Chris Hemsworth. He actually does a great job in his demanding Messianic role of Billy Lee, but I just had trouble equating the “Thor” star as being “all kinds of bad”: this felt like a slight misstep in the casting to me.
Summary
This film is without a doubt going to storm into my Top 10 for the year. It’s an entertaining delight, full of twists, turns, deliciously wordy dialogue and a satisfyingly open ending. I can’t believe this film hasn’t been top billing in multiplexes up and down the country for WEEKS on end. If you get the chance, my advice would be to seek this out before it disappears.