Sinister Vibes Save This Film from Bouts of Boredom

Rating: 7/10 (2 June 2013)

I took a chance with SINISTER because the trailers reminded me a bit of INSIDIOUS (one of the better recent horror movies) and because the initial reviews were curiously positive. Ethan Hawke is a talented actor and the trailer was pretty creepy. I would love to say it met my expectations and, at first, I suppose it did. My first viewing left me a nice creepy vibe but future viewings left me feeling a little bored. Not just because I knew the story and the final plot "twist". I knew that before I ever sat down to watch the movie because of some careless reviewers. After some thought, I realized it was because SINISTER is pretty drawn out. Writer/director Scott Derrickson and cinematographer Chris Norr have mastered creating a (no pun intended) sinister atmosphere but the movie suffers from a weak script. The movie is about a true crime novelist, Ellison Oswalt (Hawke), who moves his family into the home of a family that was brutally murdered under mysterious circumstances. Ellison uses the environment of the home to help inspire his writing while keeping his wife and kids oblivious to the fate of the home's previous tenants. He believes he's hit the mother-load when he discovers a box of old 8mm home movies in the attic. To Ellison's surprise, these are more than your average home video footagethey're a series of snuff films detailing the gruesome murders of five families. Ellison becomes obsessed with his study of the films, eager to find a missing clue as to the person behind these acts, and he uncovers a terrifying secretthat was sort of ruined in the trailers anyway.
SINISTER is a fun enough movie the first time you watch it. Even knowing the big reveal at the end, Derrickson and Norr have put together one of the creepiest movies I've seen. Most of the credit really goes to the film's music. Seriously, SINISTER has the eeriest soundtrack: part music, part ambient sound, and totally chillingespecially when paired with near total silence and the click of an 8mm projector. The snuff films are the scariest part of the film. I suppose that should go without saying. Anyway, the snuff films in this movie are done incredibly well. When combined with the minimalist soundtrack, the films (shot in actual 8mm) are haunting. SINISTER jumps right in from the very beginning with one of it's most powerful images: a family of four stand beneath a massive tree with hoods over their faces and nooses around their necks while an unseen force slowly saws away at a mammoth tree branch on the other side. Once that branch is loosed, the counterweight lifts the family off their feet and we watch them kick and struggle for a minute before finally going still. It's incredibly effective and sets the tone of the movie perfectly. The rest of the snuff films are at least as effective and give the movie its most unsettling moments. It's just a shame the rest of the movie doesn't really keep that vibe alive.
The real problem with SINISTER is how it bounces between horror/thriller and mystery. The horror elements, for the most part, do their job well. The mystery elements, not so much. A lot of the film is Ethan Hawke's Ellison as he investigates the snuff films and slowly pieces together the bigger picture. Unfortunately for SINISTER, that's where the movie starts to lose momentum. After we've seen the snuff films a few times, the effect diminishes a bit and all we're left with is Ellison playing detective. This mostly consists of Ellison being awoken in the middle of the night, experiencing something creepy, then waking up the next morning and watching the movies again with a bottle of booze and a notepad. Once you go through the cycle a few times, you just want the movie to move on to the next bit of scares. The whole supernatural element (effectively ruined in the trailers with Vincent D'Onofrio giving us the exposition via Skype) arrives in full about halfway through the movie and comes to a climax well past the point where I stopped caring. The ending is a little too predictable and might be determined well in advance by some viewers, but it plays out pretty nicely in the final 5 to 10 minutes of the movie. Ethan Hawke is great despite the little he has to work with, but his supporting cast drop the ball. Juliet Rylance is a little tooemotive. I know it's weird to claim an actress too emotive, seeing as how creating emotion is the name of their game. She doesn't quite ham it up but she comes on a little too strong. Either too happy or too angry, never quite right for the scene. Her performances reminds me of something from TV family drama; it doesn't fit well here. Ellison's kids don't get much to do, so that leaves our only other supporting cast as James Ransone as Deputy So-n-So. The deputy avoids the usual pitfall as a cop in a horror film by maintaining a good head on his shoulders. He actually becomes Ellison's voice of reason once the weirdness goes to the good author's head. Still, the deputy is mostly around to advance the story with new discoveries and guide us to the final haunting sequence.
SINISTER is not a 'great' movie but it does deserve the chance to work its creepiness on you. When you watch this movie, in an effort to get the most from the experience, watch it in a dim room with minimal background noise. Let it establish it's atmosphere and draw you in. It's good for some chills and maybe a jump scare or two. Outside of that, SINISTER might find itself doomed to be forgotten as a movie in the dreaded category of "not bad, but not great."