NO TARGET AUDIENCE
Insidious: Chapter 2
*
Review by Justin T. Bowler
I hate this movie and I hate Justin Bieber.
Justin Bieber wore a pale plastic snake around his neck to the 2011 MTV VMAs. He kept asking people if they wanted to touch his flesh-colored snake (He named it Johnson, btw). Get it? It’s like he was talking about his penis. ISN’T THAT FUNNY?!?! The answer is NO. It is not (it’s only funny to teenage jackasses that are full of themselves). “Insidious: Chapter 2” is the Justin Bieber of horror films.
Understand, that I am a fan of director James Wan. He is a great young director with a particularly good eye for horror, a great sense for creating tension, and knows how to scare an audience. Unfortunately, he doesn’t demonstrate ANY of his talents in “Insidious 2”. Instead, one feels as if this film were actually written and directed by a college student (to be fair, I’d say a 3rd or 4th year college student) (But, not one from a respected school). Oh my God, is the film is full of problems…
First, there is countless rule-changing. When you establish the rules of a film’s world, you can’t just change them to say “Gotcha! Look what we did there. You were expecting us to follow the rules, but we didn’t and we GOTCHA! Our film is SCAAARRRRYYYYY!” It would take too long to give specific examples on this. Just know that it happens. A lot! (…sigh… second year film making).
Second, along the same lines, the time travel is absurd, confusing, unnecessary, ridiculous… (pick any negative adjective and insert it). Anytime you introduce time travel into the world of a film, you have to set rules. The only rule in “Insidious: Chapter 2” is that there aren’t any rules. “Hey, we need to go back in time, we can just enter The Further”, “Hey, we need to go further back in time, we can just enter The Further”, “Hey, maybe we need to go forward in time now. We can just enter The Further” (Did a 5th grader write this script?).
Third, there are completely unnecessary “scary” environments. In order for our heroes to learn about their foe, they must look up his record at a hospital. But, it isn’t a normal hospital. It is an abandoned hospital. You know, the scary kind (this “abandoned” hospital still has beds, machines, powered down computers, and even a full records vault. However, it is dark and full of cobwebs, which makes it SCAAAAARRRRYYYY) (It begs you to ask yourself “When this hospital closed down, why did everyone just vacate it, without collecting anything at all? Aren’t those hospital records important? Why wouldn’t patients request their records to be transferred to their current doctor? Why wouldn’t the owners of the hospital try to sell the equipment in it? Why wouldn’t homeless beggars, hobos, and squatters take up residence in this perfectly fine abandoned six story building?”). Don’t even get me started on the perfectly generic theme park haunted house they have to go to for no reason at all (rocking horses that move on their own. That’s original!). Decaying bodies don’t stink until you lift up a sheet that is covering them (wouldn’t one decaying body stink up a house?) (Wouldn’t an entire room full of decaying bodies stink up the city street?) (Of course not, they are covered with sheets. You can’t smell them until you take it off).
To add to that implausibility…
“What? Dad is stuck in ANOTHER DIMENSION? Mom, I can go get him. All I have to do is go to sleep.“
“That’s a great idea honey. Just nap in the corner while Evil Dad is trying to break down the door with an ax.”
Thirty seconds later, despite the fact that the child was just running, despite the fact that there is a loud ax breaking down the door a few feet away from him, despite the fact that his mom and younger brother are in mortal danger, the child falls asleep inside of thirty seconds (did I mention it all happened inside of THIRTY SECONDS?!?!).
The list of Stupid just goes on and on. Some scenes seem to be missing and other scenes are completely useless (two characters get into a car, sit in silence while they drive, then stop at a random place to talk, then drive back home. Apparently, silence while driving creates tension). Way to go, Mr. Wan!
Then, after you have given your time and money to this movie (hopefully, you didn’t pay for it, but just sneaked into the theater (if you insist on seeing this movie, PLEASE sneak into it)), the movie gives you one final middle finger. After the last line is uttered, it goes to black. Then, the movie audibly attacks you just before the credits. In this moment, the director clearly expects the crowds to scream and then applaud. Instead, the audience just stares and laughs at how dumb the attempt was.
I’ve seen some terrible movies, but I have to say that this is one of the absolute WORST films I’ve ever seen. It’s not even bad in a fun way. It is just bad. It’s insultingly bad, it is mockingly bad, it is an affront to film making, YET, the film thinks it is AWESOME!!! It doesn’t make you scared, it makes you want to punch the film in the face. Like I said, this film is the Justin Beiber of horror movies (I don’t know, maybe young teenage girls like it).
1 star (but only if you are the target audience (and I have no idea who the target audience is for this film)).
Directed by: James Wan
Release Date: September 13, 2013
Run Time: 106 Minutes
Country: USA
Rated: PG-13
Distributor: Film District
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