CG Monthly Reviews: Insidious

In 2004 Australian director James Wan and his writing partner Leigh Whannell released a little horror movie that they shot in 18 days for a budget of roughly a million dollars. That film was Saw and it instantly became a $100 million hit worldwide. It was always intended to be simply a showcase for the budding filmmakers that they hoped with turn a small profit on DVD and set them up for bigger and better things. Instead the film became a phenomenon, launched 6 sequels, and along with Hostel kicked off the 2000s preeminent horror trend and media buzzword “torture porn.” How to follow a decade-defining work was a challenge for Wan and Whannell. The pair made it clear early on that they never considered themselves gore merchants (in fact the first Saw is light on gore compared to the increasingly grizzly sequels) and tried to embrace subtle scares with their ventriloquist dummy sophomore slump Dead Silence. When that film bombed, Wan tried to switch genres with the exploitation reveng…