Not original, but not bad either

Rating: 7/10 (20 June 2016)

I think it was 'Poltergeist' which set the template for modern horror, i.e. family finds out house is haunted, doesn't believe it, does believe it, calls experts and then resolution. 'Insidious,' like so many other post eighties horror films, follows that formula to the letter. However, whereas most are pretty forgettable, this one has just about enough scares and creepiness in it to make it worth watching.
It's hardly worth going into detail regarding the plot, as I'm reasonably smug that I've summed it up sufficiently in my opening paragraph. Patrick Wilson and Rose Byrne play the mum and dad. Yup, they're happy, successful and have three children. They play the parts well from everyday doting parents to disbelieving and supernaturally-harassed protagonists and they do nothing to make you not want to root for them. Especially when one of their children slips into an unusual coma and his housebound ever after. But that's when the haunting begins...
Instead of being sucked into the TV-dimension, he's stuck in another afterlife and spirits want to get into our world via him. Those dastardly spirits (including one that looks like Darth Maul from Star Wars: The Phantom Menace – so it's nice to see the poor Sith Lord can still get work after that depressing inclusion into the sci-fi franchise) follow the family from house to house until the mandatory local paranormal expert is called in to sort the spooks out.
Cue the resolution. I won't spoil it as sometimes the family wins and sometimes they get horribly murdered and it ends on a downer, but, once again, the resolution follows. Like I say, this is 'horror by the numbers' but it's good enough to watch. If you're a horror fan then you've probably seen better, but that's because you've probably got classic horror films among your DVD collection. However, you probably won't see many – recent – horror films that create a creepy/tense atmosphere. Give it a go.