Insidious: Chapter 2

Rating: 5/10 (20 September 2013)

I did not realise there was going to a sequel to the film I found absolutely terrifying in the cinema until I see the trailer on TV, I was definitely curious to see what would happen next in the story, from the returning makers of Saw and Paranormal Activity, and returning director James Wan (Saw). Basically the film opens in 1986 to see Young Lorraine Lambert (Jocelin Donahue) being visited by medium Young Elise Rainier (Lindsay Seim), called by her fellow medium friend Young Carl (Hank Harris), to investigate and perhaps eliminate a haunting in Lorraine's son, Young Josh Lambert (Garrett Ryan). She hypnotises him and attempts to find Josh's friend, the elderly woman in the black wedding dress and veil, seen in photographs, and after an encounter with the nasty spirit Carl, Elise and Lorraine agree that Josh should be made to forget his abilities to dream and leave his body and go to further places. Twenty five years later the story continues from where it left off, Elise (Lin Shaye) was killed by Josh (Patrick Wilson) who was possessed by the spirit of the old woman, and his wife Renai (Rose Byrne) is being questioned by police, and after refusing to believe he is a killer she and the family move in with Lorraine (Barbara Hershey). Soon enough after the move Renai notices strange things happening in the house, she believes that Josh is still possessed by the spirit of the old woman, he assures her things will be fine, then of course she sees another woman in a white dress and is knocked unconscious tending to her baby. Meanwhile Lorraine, who knows something is still going on as well, visits Elise's colleagues Specs (Saw's Leigh Whannell, also writing) and Tucker (Angus Sampson), and they recruit the help of the medium from the past, Carl (Steve Coulter), and he uses his method of lettered dice to contact Elise from the other side. Through these they do contact her and are led to the "Our Lady of Angels" hospital, where Lorraine used to work, and exploring the closed down and decayed hospital Lorraine recounts the story of a former elderly patient named Parker Crane, who committed suicide jumping from the roof. They next break into the house of Parker, and they find the black wedding dress and veil and newspapers referring to "The Dark Bride" who murdered many people while dressed as a woman, they realise that the elderly woman spirit is in fact Parker, and worse, it was in fact the spirit of Parker's Mother (Danielle Bisutti) talking through the dice, not Elise. Renai recovers, but when Lorraine returns home she insists that she and the kids, Dalton (Ty Simpkins), Foster (Andrew Astor) and the baby must get away from Josh, and she explains about "The Dark Bride" and that Josh may still be trapped somewhere on the other side, the Further. Carl confronts Josh himself, while Specs and Tucker are listening from their van, but possessed ultimately he is stronger than the three of them, and next to be ambushed are Renai and Lorraine, while his mother is locked in the closet he attempts to strangle his wife, but the children stop him and the three of them barricade themselves in the basement. Dalton knows that he could use his ability to travel out of his body into the Further to try and find his father, so while the possessed Josh tries to hammer his way to catch his family the boy finds Carl, and together they try and find Elise, and they realise they are all in the previous Lambert home. In the Further, Josh, Carl and Elise head for the Crane house, they witness the traumatic past of Parker being abused by his mother to convince him he is a girl, the mother tries to torment the visitors of this vision, but Elise saves them all by defeating the mother. The three escape the house and find Josh, Dalton helps them find the way back into real time by following the string of his tin can telephone, and returning to the real world all wake up in their own bodies, including Josh who is back to normal., they are all relieved. Josh and Dalton are hypnotised to forget their ability to travel within the dream and spirit worlds and everything that has happened, the end sees Specs and Tucker knocking another door to help someone, and while the girl Allison is in comatose Elise walks in to speak to her, but then she hears something and turns around to exclaim "Oh my god!", so the story should continue again. Also starring Tyler Griffin as Young Parker and Michael Beach as Detective Sendal. There is still some resemblance to Poltergeist and partly Paranormal Activity, and the haunted house element obviously still resonates (even though it is the people who are haunted, not quite the house), it is a shame that in the cinema this is not as terrifying as the first film, but the screechy violin music still chills, and it is a good enough supernatural horror thriller sequel. Worth watching!