Insidious is a 2011 American independent^[4] psychological horror film written by Leigh Whannell, directed by James Wan, and starring Patrick Wilson, Rose Byrne, Lin Shaye, and Barbara Hershey. The story centers on a couple whose son inexplicably enters a comatose state and becomes a vessel for ghosts in an astral dimension. The film was released in theaters on April 1, 2011.^[1] The film has been nominated for 10 awards.

Plot[link]

In the opening credits, a dark house is seen with shadowy figures lurking in the background, confirming the presence of ghosts.

In present day, Renai and Josh Lambert (Rose Byrne and Patrick Wilson) have recently moved into a new house with their three children. One morning, Renai looks through a family photo album with her son, Dalton (Ty Simpkins), who asks why there are no pictures of Josh when he was a child. Renai reasons that he has always been camera shy. One day, Dalton hears something in the attic and goes to investigate. He sees something that scares him and falls when the attic ladder breaks. The next day, Dalton does not awaken from sleep. Renai and Josh rush him to the hospital where the doctors say he is in an unexplained coma.

Three months later, Dalton is moved home, still in a coma. Shortly after, disturbing events begin to occur. Renai believes the house is haunted when she begins to see and hear other people in the house. She confronts Josh about the events and the family soon moves to another house. In the new house, increasingly violent and supernatural events occur again. Josh's mother Lorraine (Barbara Hershey), contacts a friend, Elise Reiner (Lin Shaye), who deals with paranormal activities. The family, Elise, and her team go into Dalton's room. There, Elise sees and describes a figure to one of her two assistants, who draws a black figure with a red face and dark hollow eyes on the ceiling of Dalton's room.

Elise explains to Renai and Josh that Dalton has the ability to astral project while sleeping and that he has been doing it since he was very young. The reason he is in a comatose state is because he has travelled too far into different spiritual worlds due to a lack of fear (he believes the projections are dreams), becoming lost in a land called 'The Further', which is a place for tormented souls of the dead. While his spirit is in the other world, he has left nothing but a lifeless body. The tormented souls crave another chance at life while the demon plans to possess Dalton for pure malice. However, for a spirit to get into a body, it requires time and energy.

Skeptical at first, Josh later relents when he discovers Dalton had been drawing pictures which resemble the demonic figure Elise described. They run a session to try and communicate with Dalton where the demon uses Dalton's body to fight the group, along with 3 other spirits who want Dalton's body. After the session, Elise calls Lorraine and the two reveal to the couple that Josh also can astral project, and was terrorized by an evil spirit during his childhood. Lorraine shows them pictures from Josh's childhood, revealing a shadowy old woman (the same woman from the beginning of the film) nearer and nearer to Josh in each picture, which explains his fear of photos. Elise suggests that Josh should use his ability to find and help return Dalton's soul, to which Josh agrees.

Josh projects himself into The Further, finds and frees his son, who had been captured by the red-faced demon. In search of their physical bodies, Josh and Dalton flee the demon that is pursuing them. Just before the two awaken, Josh abandons his son to confront the shadowy old woman who appears to be inside his house. As he shouts for her to get away from him, she retreats into the darkness. Moments later, Josh and Dalton both awaken, just as all the spirits vanish.

With the family now happily reunited, Renai, Dalton and Lorraine chat in the kitchen as Elise and Josh pack up from the long night. Josh hands Elise the pictures from his childhood, and as she takes them from his hands, she senses something and takes a picture of Josh. He promptly goes into a rage, claiming she knows that he doesn't like to get photographed. Renai hears Josh yelling and goes into the room to find Elise dead and Josh gone. She searches for Josh and comes across Elise's camera. When she looks at the camera, she sees a picture of an old woman. It's revealed that what Elise saw was Josh's old and dirty hand and nails, similar to the old woman's, implying that she has possessed him. Josh then puts his hand on Renai's shoulder, and she is horrified to see her husband behind her.

After the post-credits, the shadowy, old woman can be seen blowing out a candle.

Cast[link]

• Ty Simpkins as Dalton Lambert
• Patrick Wilson as Josh Lambert
• Rose Byrne as Renai Lambert
• Lin Shaye as Elise Rainier
• Leigh Whannell as Specs
• Angus Sampson as Tucker
• Barbara Hershey as Lorraine Lambert
• Andrew Astor as Foster Lambert
• Philip Friedman as The Old Woman
• Corbett Tuck as Nurse Adele/Doll Girl 2
• Heather Tocquigny as Nurse Kelly
• Ruben Pla as Dr. Sercarz
• John Henry Binder as Father Martin
• Josh Feldman as Young Josh (uncredited)
• Omar Apanco Salgado as Hispanic Student (uncredited)
• Jeannette Sousa as Dr. Thimble (uncredited)
• Joseph Bishara as Lipstick-face Demon
• J. Larose as Long Haired Fiend
• Kelly Devoto as Doll Girl 1
• Lary Crews as 1940's whistling dad in The Further (thanks)
• Caslin Rose as Ghoul/Contortionist (uncredited)

Reception[link]

Insidious has received generally positive reviews. Review aggregate Rotten Tomatoes reports that 68% of critics have given the film a positive review based on 157 reviews, with an average score of 6.0. The critical consensus is: "Aside from a shaky final act, Insidious is a very scary and very fun haunted house thrill ride."^[5] Roger Ebert gave the film 2 1/2 stars out of 4 saying, "It depends on characters, atmosphere, sneaky happenings and mounting dread. This one is not terrifically good, but moviegoers will get what they're expecting." Steve O' Brien from WCBS-FM says " Most Terrifying Film since The Exorcist".^[6]

A number of negative reviews reported that the second half of the film did not match the development of the first. Mike Hale of The New York Times wrote that "the strongest analogue for the second half of Insidious is one that the filmmakers probably weren’t trying for: it feels like a less poetic version of an M. Night Shyamalan fairy tale."^[7] Similarly, James Berardinelli commented, "[i]f there's a complaint to be made about Insidious, it's that the film's second half is unable to live up to the impossibly high standards set by the first half."^[8] Ethan Gilsdorf of The Boston Globe wrote that "[t]he film begins with promise" but "[t]he crazy train of Insidious runs fully off the rails when the filmmakers go logical and some of the strange gets explained away as a double shot of demonic possession and astral projection."^[9]

Positive reviews have focused on the filmmakers' ability to build suspense. John Anderson of The Wall Street Journal explains "[w]hat makes a movie scary isn't what jumps out of the closet. It's what might jump out of the closet. The blood, the gore and the noise of so many fright films miss the horrifying point: Movie watchers are far more convinced, instinctively, that what we don't know will most assuredly hurt us... Insidious establishes that these folks can make a film that operates on an entirely different level, sans gore, or obvious gimmicks. And make flesh crawl."^[10] Michael Phillips of the Chicago Tribune wrote: "director James Wan and screenwriter Leigh Whannell admire all sorts of fright, from the blatant to the insidiously subtle. This one lies at an effective halfway point between those extremes."^[11] Peter Travers of Rolling Stone commented: "Here's a better-than-average spook house movie, mostly because Insidious decides it can haunt an audience without spraying it with blood."^[12] Christy Lemire of the Associated Press stated: "Insidious is the kind of movie you could watch with your eyes closed and still feel engrossed by it. It's a haunted-house thriller filled with all the usual creaking doors, groaning floors and things that go bump in the night, but it'll also grab you with some disturbing, raspy whispers on a baby monitor, a few melancholy piano plunkings and the panicky bleating of an alarm as a front door is mysteriously flung open in the middle of the night."^[13]

Box office[link]

The film opened with $13,271,464, making it #3 at the domestic box office behind Hop and Source Code. It has since grossed a total of $54,009,150 domestically and $43,000,000 internationally, for a total of $97,009,150 worldwide.^[14]

Awards and nominations[link]

Sequel[link]

A sequel for Insidious has been announced and is scheduled to be released in 2013. Director James Wan and writer Leigh Whannell are in talks to return to helm the follow-up.^[15]

Home media release[link]

Insidious was released on DVD and Blu-ray on July 12, 2011.^[16][17][18]

Soundtracks[link]

• Tiny Tim - "Tiptoe Through the Tulips" (1968)
• Ludovico Einaudi - "Nuvole Bianche" (2004)
• George Crumb - "Black Angels" (1971)

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official website
• Insidious at the Internet Movie Database
• Insidious at Box Office Mojo
• Insidious at Rotten Tomatoes
• Insidious at Metacritic