Insidious: Chapter 2 (2013)

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The Pact (2012)

"As a woman struggles to come to grips with her past in the wake of her mother's death, an unsettling presence emerges in her childhood home."

Ah, the old bait and switch. I only wanted to watch "The Pact" to see more of Agnes Bruckner, but she was only in it for just over six minutes. Then it was all down to Caity Lotz to carry the rest of the film.

I was impressed by the casting since Anges Bruckner and Caity Lotz physically matched each other really well as sisters. Caity Lotz was a little bit more freckly and didn't have lots of nasty tattoos of crucifixes all over her, but they still could have been siblings in real life.

As for the story, well, it was okay even though it seemed to take forever to get to where it was going. For something so ridiculously predictable, I suppose the writer/director, Nicholas McCarthy, tried to add a couple of original touches to the formula, but they just made things unnecessarily unfocused and slightly confusing.

The jump scares were nicely done. The one with "Global Maps" (no prizes for guessing that it was really "Google Maps" rebranded) caught me out even though I half-expected it. I had my pizza plate in front of my monitor as I watched this on my computer so I was up real close and personal at that moment. That was by far the best bit though.

Another surprise for me was seeing Casper Van Dien is something other than a SyFy movie again. Without the grey in his beard, he's hardly changed at all over the years. He probably has a magic portrait hidden in his attic or something. I thought he did quite well as the cop in this and I was a bit sorry to see the end of his character. His was the only character that I cared about.

The big twist (which wasn't really a twist) turned out to be far too like a certain movie from 1989 starring Gary Busey, and that knocked a lot of points from my final rating. Up until that point, I would have said that "The Pact" was just below average. The fact that a supernatural entity wasn't singly responsible for everything meant that it was a total disaster.

Here's the thing. There was a ghost in the house which could move objects and violently drag people around yet it couldn't do anything to its own murderer? That made no sense to me and, nor, for that matter, did the epilogue. Once again, a horror movie missed its punchline by continuing to ramble on for another ten minutes.

I was actually looking forward to "The Pact" but, overall, it was a huge disappointment caused by inept directing, bad pacing, and really weak characterisation. Some of the camerawork left a lot to be desired as well.

Insidious (2010)

"When proud parents take possession of an old house, an accident results in one of their sons falling into a coma. The tragedy doesn't stop there when they are beset by vengeful spirits from another realm in this new chiller by the director and writer of Saw and by the producers of Paranormal Activity."

I've read that "Insidious" is just a reworking of "Poltergeist" (1982) with Darth Maul as the bad guy. Has anyone seen it yet to confirm this?

The story also sounds a lot like like "They Wait" (2007) to me especially the part about the kid being in a coma.

Having also read that it's supposed to be really scary but with a big chunk of comic relief added by the paranormal investigators, should I be worried that this is more of a comedy than a real horror movie?

I'm probably not going to see "Insidious" at the cinema anyway because yet another PG-13 horror doesn't interest me in the slightest, but I'd like to read your thoughts on this movie before I make up my mind.

If you've written a review of "Insidious", please leave a link to it in the comments below.

1408 (2007)

Outstanding for the first 40 minutes or so with a great build-up and atmosphere but then it all got too messy and confusing.

I actually fell asleep about 15 minutes before the end and had to rewind and watch it again. The ending was a typical Stephen King let down though and nothing was really explained.

John Cusack did a great job but the effects were nothing more than you would see in "The Frighteners" or one of the older "Amityville" rip-offs. The camerawork ranged from average to awkward and some scenes were just too "busy" to enjoy. It reminded me a lot of "White Noise 2" in places which was also not a good thing.

There was nothing very scary here either other than wondering if John Cusack was going to fall out of the window at any point. He didn't and it was very disappointing especially with the obvious "homage" scene to the second best part of "Cat's Eye".

I didn't realise this was another of those crappy kiddie-friendly horrors until it was too late. If it had been made for adults, I'm sure that it could have been a much better film.

My rating? 2 out of 10.