Insidious

A pretty intense and scary ghost film that only uses the best of the tried and tested genre elements the viewer is always guaranteed to enjoy. The script is weaker (come up with an original horror film nowadays), but James Wan has really played with the form and his imaginative direction doesn't let you breathe practically throughout. The actors are also very good, the atmosphere is chilling and disturbing, and the music is strong enough to underscore the scares and amplify their effect. And if I said I didn't get chills down my spine during the final scene, I'd be lying like a politician... :) It has steamrolled Paranormal Activity. 80% (04/12/2022)

A beginning like Paranormal Activity, a middle like Poltergeist, and an ending like Brian Yuzna. I don't understand why anyone wants to make a tired piece of crap like this these days. I put it on at 10pm, with the wind whipping the trees outside, I live alone, and the sound is full on. Sure, I was scared, I even choked on my Coke, but for God’s sake it was nothing else. I could pull just as spectacular a jump scare in a heartbeat on my rat without any resources (and it's a pretty intrepid rat), so I don't understand what James Wan was trying to prove. It has its stronger moments – the uptight family, for example, reminded me of the perfect The Cell, but otherwise it's all terribly... about nothing. Then the ending is a total throwback to the 80's, a fair fight with a ghost, a practically off-the-shelf demon, and a huh huh huh surprise finale. The main villain, in any case, is hilarious. He's always popping up somewhere, but he doesn't do anything, all you have to do is hide behind your bed in such a way that your whole torso is showing and you're free of him. Monsters live in closets, and... God, that I’m even wasting my time. Stars for music and the family. (10/06/2011)

Fred Pytl's residential monster cabaret with an elephant grandmother, a gerontophilic bride, a necrophile metal-head and the pedophile devil Bertík. On earth it is possible, in the astral plane it is astral garbage filmed as a Saturday television party with a Vampire and its grave sewers. The scariest part of this is the number of non-flowing dialogues, from which Bela Lugosi would also grow old. (04/15/2013)

Nowadays, James Wan is a horror movie god. It’s just a shame that when I saw Insidious, he started going around saying that he already has enough horror movies in his portfolio and that he’d love to focus on other genres. Because he just makes great horrors. He can do amazing jumpscares, he can create an absolutely magnificent atmosphere and the best of all, he keeps paying homage to other people in his industry. It’s obvious that movies are a great hobby of his. And even though I’m “only” giving this movie three stars, it’s still a movie that had everything a proper horror should. The story itself just didn’t sit right with me. But it got on a pretty good road in the sequel. (05/07/2014)

As long as Wan sticks to classic waters, it’s nothing miraculous, but it works. But as soon as he strays into uncharted, astral waters, everything goes up the pipes, because everything suddenly turns so dumb and ridiculous that there is no room for atmosphere or tension; which of course I expect, when watching similar genre movies at three in the morning with the volume on full. (06/25/2011)