Insidious

Patrick Wilson and Rose Byrne star as Josh and Renai - a married couple moving into their dream house with the family. As quick as you can say, "bump in the night," the clan is subject to some strange occurrences.

Stuff is being moved around the house.

Noises are calling to them from the attic, and their son, Dalton (Ty Simpkins), has fallen into a strange coma no doctor can explain.

As more frightening incidents occur, will Josh and Renai be able to keep their family safe?

What is plaguing Dalton?

Is the house haunted ... or worse?

Insidious feels like a traditional, old fashioned horror movie in all of the right ways. Director James Wan and writer Leigh Whannell (the guys who made the good Saw movie) rely heavily on classic shocks, surprises and scares, instead of the bloody and disgusting type movies most horror films devolve into these days.

Obviously made without a huge budget, Insidious does suffer at moments when Wan is trying to create other worlds and demons that will scare us, but end up looking cheap. For the most part, Insidious plays like an homage to 1950's horror films, but the images would be more frightening and creepy in black and white. Yet, Wan is skilled enough to overcome the monetary disadvantages by creating enough tense moments that play on our psyche.

However, Whannell and Wan allow Insidious to get too campy at times. They are doing a fantastic job freaking us out throughout the first half of the movie, which is why I was shocked and disappointed to see humor used in an ill-advised way. Whannell and Angus Sampson show up as a couple of ghost hunters who serve as comic relief that is not needed nor welcome. The audience is wrapped up in the scary psychological aspects of Insidious, and these two goofballs shatter that.

The first half of Insidious is great, but the film loses steam as it gets bigger and out of control.

Insidious is rated PG-13 for thematic material, violence, terror and frightening images, and brief strong.