(Icon Home Entertainment)

Glass half empty, or glass half full?

This is a horror film about split personality disorders – except that it’s not about split personalities at all. That’s simply what Aussie filmmakers Leigh Whannell – that (Recovery) movie guy – and James ‘Saw’ Wan must have been suffering from when they conceived this both excellent and dire ghost story. I love a spooky haunted house film, with Robert Wise’s 1963 classic The Haunting one of my all-time favourites. And for the first half of this film, Insidious is pretty much up there with it in terms of eeriness. Rose Byrne and Patrick Wilson, both excellently straight-faced throughout, are parents Renae and Josh, who have just moved into a new home with their three children. When one of the children falls into an unexplained coma, the manifestation of a ghostly malevolence causes the family to move elsewhere. The only problem is, the haunting follows them and gets scarily worse, forcing Renae and Josh to call in some ghost hunters – played with student film-level hamminess by Whannell and, good grief, Angus from Recovery – and … well, here’s where the film devolves into a sideshow spook house full of dry ice clouds and over-thought plot devices involving astral travel. No kidding, the very moment Whannell and Angus Sampson appear onscreen, the film just goes completely off the rails. The result would be awe-inspiring if it didn’t so thoroughly mark the end of an impressive old-school horror film and the beginning of a very, very silly one. By the end you’ll be watching it through your fingers, but not for the right reasons. Nevertheless, thanks to the wonderfully creepy and well-played first half, Insidious earns itself the enthusiastic sound of one hand clapping.

**½

TOPHER HEALY

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