Sinister (Scott Derrickson)

[Rowland]

IMDb (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1922777/)

http://i301.photobucket.com/albums/nn52/drowland811/SINISTER-POSTER.jpg

[Rowland]

A solid short story here, severely undermined by endless padding comprised largely of Hawke investigating dark areas with a flashlight and/or baseball bat, and that's when he isn't putting his family, who the film ignores to a detrimental extent, at obvious risk by making one foolish decision after another. In short, he is a complete asshat, and both the grim trajectory of his character and the predictable narrative reveals prove unsatisfying. Some creepy imagery and sound design mitigates, but hardly enough so to salvage the film as a whole. Derrickson's best movie is still his direct-to-video Hellraiser sequel.

[Boner M]

Should link our very own NickGlass (http://www.slantmagazine.com/film/review/sinister/6602)'s Slant review. That kid's going places!

[Watashi]

Do they let anyone on Slant these days?

I kid I kid

[DavidSeven]

Should link our very own NickGlass (http://www.slantmagazine.com/film/review/sinister/6602)'s Slant review. That kid's going places!

This very cool to see. A little bizarre, but very cool.

Congrats, man.

[megladon8]

Got tickets to see this on Sunday.

I love going to see movies before noon. $6 can't be beat.

[Bosco B Thug]

A morbid, pretty useless, moribund piece of occult tale (I agree with Rowland, very short-story-ish) capitalizing. Useless in its thematic cocktailing (Fame! Marriage! Something nothing to do with anything!), moribund in its groundless plotting and its valiant effort to adapt the narrative novelty of creepy internet tales instead of Hollywood beginning-middle-endings, but completely failing to be creepy.

The trailer was 10x scarier. Derrickson handles the mid-film marriage squabble quite well, though, and it's just kind of refreshing in today's drama-less horror output.

[megladon8]

Sounds pretty moribund.

[Irish]

I'm interested in seeing this, but heard

it has no real resolution, ie: the ending sucks.

Confirm/ deny?

[Bosco B Thug]

I'm interested in seeing this, but heard

it has no real resolution, ie: the ending sucks.

Confirm/ deny? Umm... Vague answer-spoilers:

It has a resolution, but it's rooted in its nature as more of a campfire tale than a slam-bang horror movie.

In other words, it's not Insidious (though I'd have to say I admire this film more than Insidious, despite being not as "fun").

But the film definitely does taper off to less adrenaline-pumping routes going towards the conclusion.

[Irish]

Great answer. That's something I can live with.

Thanks, Bosco.

[megladon8]

Not awful, but certainly not as inspired as Insidious. Hawke gives a strong performance and the concept is rich, but too many cheap jump scares and a repetitive second act slowed the film to a hault before anything substantial happened.

Then all of a sudden it was on fast forward, and then it was all over.

I really wanted more "meat". Where Insidious suffered a bit in its final act by showing too much, going a bit over the top, this one does the opposite and leaves too much in the dark.

An intriguing idea, but falls short. Still an above average competently made horror film, but nothing too memorable.

[Skitch]

Sinister review (a.k.a. The 100% True Story Of The Most Fucked Up Theater Experience Of My Entire Life): As most of you already know, I have the worst luck with theater crowds. Those of you that think I exaggerate or embellish need only ask anyone who's seen a movie with me. This has driven me to see most movies in the dollar theater, on weekdays, noonish, with the lowest possible number of theater-goers. I decided to sit in the next-to-last row, as the last row just being a couple seats here and there deters anyone from sitting behind me. Anyone, that is, except the 100 year old overweight monster of a woman who sat in the weird loner back row seat. She sat, coughed, sneezed, hocked up a loogie, talked to herself, and began shuffling papers, presumably doing her taxes before the movie begins. Wonderful.

As the lights go down, in stroll two fellows. Now I'm not one to judge. Perhaps they were hipsters who were very conscientious about being green, therefore hiked everywhere. Or they where homeless, their floor-length trenchcoats double as their blankets, and they're stuffed full backpacks contain all their worldly belongings. At any rate, in this world where crazies are shooting up public places, these dudes looked as shady as could be. These winners chose seats two rows in front of me.

With The Strangers and insidious, Sinister has a place in a new horror-subgenre called Terror. The difference? A steady build up of suspense versus surprise-based shockers that all the screaming in the world will not cleanse from your soul.

Sinister has several bits of "stupid people doing stupid things", but they aren't dealbreakers. I will elaborate:
1. Problem: the house you just bought may be haunted.
Their solution: Investigate.
My solution: Sell house.
2. Problem: electric goes out, loud bang in attic, sounds of people walking up there.
Their solution: investigate with cell phone light and baseball bat.
My solution: burn down house.
3. Problem: still photos on computer move to look at you.
Their solution: close laptop.
My solution: close laptop and mail to David Duchovney, move to Himalayas and become a monk.

It should be noted that the crazy old broad behind me has been muttering to herself the entire movie so far. Its really damn creepy. She repeats lines in the movie, and talks to the characters, but only in muttering. As the movie reached its climax, she jumped up and began preparing to leave. She zipped up her swish swish swish windbreaker (still talking to herself, as all hell is breaking loose in the film), and began pacing back-and-forth in the back of the theater, pausing only to hover over me occasionally. Swish swish mumble mumble HOVER mumble mumble swish swish. Its very hard to watch a movie, make sure two potential psychopaths aren't digging guns out of their bags, and turn around to make sure the crazy bitch behind you doesn't shiv you.

This is all 100% true.

Sinister is a scary movie. People are scarier.

[ciaoelor]

An atmospheric, fairly intense treat until the kids half bow their heads and hold their index finger to their lips. The soundtrack is fantastic.

[Henry Gale]

An atmospheric, fairly intense treat until the kids half bow their heads and hold their index finger to their lips. The soundtrack is fantastic.

Completely agree here, especially about Christopher Young's score and the generally strong, creepy feel to it, so I'm pretty surprised that I'm the first actual yay for this. It is flawed, but I still found it more effectively scary than the majority of the recent onslaught of "This new house ain't what it seems!" / "Ancient demon needs a place to stay" horror.

Also this io9 article (http://io9.com/5952017/the-best-way-to-re+interpret-the-ending-to-the-movie-sinister) captures a lot of similar feels I had about the ending, though a lot of it could just as easily provide material for a sequel that wants to deal with a different angle to this film's events.

I still prefer Mama, The Last Exorcism, and even Insidious' brand of assured lunacy, but I'm all for seeing this sort of micro-budgeted horror being made more often, especially when it's so well-realized that it doesn't remind me of how little it cost like this.

[megladon8]

This was quite a bit better on a second viewing, but I still wish it had ended about 5 minutes earlier...

...with Hawke bound and the daughter approaching him with the axe. We knew what was going to happen after that point, so seeing the movie go through the motions of her joining Buhghul and the other kids (and then that laughably bad jump scare with Buhghul putting his face in the camera) felt totally pointless.

But the "home movies" are effectively horrifying, the music is eerie and equally disturbing, and the performances are solid all around, with Deputy So-and-So providing effective, subtle comic relief.

I'm really liking a good chunk of the output from these producers (Insidious, Dark Skies, The Conjuring and this).

[Dukefrukem]

I'm trying to decide if I like this or not. I'm annoyed at this movie because it falls into the category of scaring the viewer, but doing almost nothing to the characters in the movie. The scene where the four kids are essentially mocking Ethan Hawk by sulking into the shadows every time he turns around. He doesn't really actually see anything until there's 20 minutes left in the movie. He certainly is convinced there is something wrong with the house, but with no actual evidence.

These ghosts also pose no threat to the characters, which I HATE in possession/ghost movies. It sucks the scares of the movie. Why should I be scared if ghosts are trying to teach someone a lesson?