Insidious: Chapter 2 review

IvyLee Rosario – Editor In Chief

The summer is one of the most important times of the year for any movie lover. Big blockbusters take to the big screen, while others plummet from being too eager to succeed. But what about the movie premieres for the rest of the year? With October just around the corner, the need for good horror films is at an all time high.

Being an avid movie lover ever since childhood, I am very particular when it comes to what kinds of movies I watch. With horror, it has to be something that catches my attention and if it can creep me out from the preview, then I’d give it a try. Case in point, “Insidious: Chapter 2.”

For all who have never heard of “Insidious,” the movie stars Patrick Wilson, Rose Byrne and Barbara Hershey. Wilson and Byrne play married couple Josh and Renai who start experiencing paranormal activity throughout their home. The problems start occurring when their son Dalton goes into a coma with no warning after an incident in their attic. Little do they know that there is much more to his endless sleep as they explore the paranormal, and rediscover the past in order to wake up their son.

“Chapter 2” starts the story the day after the ending of the first movie. Brace yourself for some spoilers because in order to understand “Chapter 2” you have to see the first film. In the first “Insidious” movie, we find out that Dalton is not really in a coma but a dream state between two worlds: the living and the dead. He is stuck in this place called The Further because a spirit wants to inhabit his body to live once again in the real world. Dalton got the ability to travel between these two worlds from his father who experienced similar issues as a child and had his memories suppressed to keep the spirits away.

The movie ends when Josh rescues Dalton from The Further, but also brings back the spirit of the woman who haunted him as a child. The spirit, while inhabited in Josh’s body kills Elise, a specialist in the paranormal, who was helping the family. “Chapter 2” takes place the night after her death in which Josh is being accused of the murder because technically it was not him that killed Elise, but just his body. So this leaves us with the question of whether Josh got rid of the spirit or if it is still inhabiting his body and pretending to be him.

I particularly enjoyed “Chapter 2” because it did a great job of summarizing any back-story that may have left questions for viewers of the first movie. They go over the story of the spirit that haunts Josh and why it haunts him, when his journey between the worlds of the living and dead started occurring and why Dalton was still suffering from the dreams as well.

Although it gave me more answers in terms of storyline, the movie was not as scary as the first. “Insidious: Chapter 2” spent more time making sure everything linked from one idea to the next, that it forgot in some parts that it was actually supposed to be a horror film. It had the cliché creepy children, moving toys, figures hiding in closets and ironically ghosts under sheets like Halloween costumes. I do have to say the red masked figure in the first Insidious movie was far creepier than the “black veiled bride.” Overall, I think “Chapter 2” did a good job of summing up the entire story line of the “Insidious” movies. The ending left us with a possible installment of a part three but I guess us scary movie lovers will have to wait and see how far they can take the film.