Monday, April 18, 2011

Insidious: What's That Saying About Imitation & Flattery?

 I went to see Insidious the other day, and while I found it quite entertaining, and even got a couple genuine chills, I really can't imagine writing the 9,823rd review of the film.  You can read about it pretty much anywhere. Instead, I give you some similarities I picked up on during the course of the film.
Here goes:

Insidious (obviously)


The Exorcist

Insidious

The Blair Witch Project

Insidious

Signs

Insidious

The Exorcist

Insidious

Star Wars Episode 1: The Phantom Menace


Insidious

Dead Silence

Insidious

The Shining

Insidious

Poltergeist

Insidious

The Exorcist

Insidious

Paranormal Activity

Insidious

The Entity

Insidious

Drag Me To Hell

Insidious

My Bloody Valentine


     "Life and death are one thread, the same line viewed from different sides."  ~ Lao Tzu

9 comments:

B.R. said...

Hate to say it, but that pic from Insidious with the shadow standing by the bed seems more like Nosferatu than the Exorcist. Orlock could do with more exposure here, don't you think? One question though; on a scale of one to ten, where would you place this film? Because I'll watch just about any horror movie if it looks fun.

Christine Hadden said...

Well BR, I chose The Exorcist because after having seen the movie the thing in the corner was much more Exorcist to me - and it isn't a shadow BTW. And not a vampire. But the long fingers, yep - those looked like Orlock.
I'd have to give it a solid 7, but I'm not much for strict ratings - it's why I don't do the whole "two butcher knives" rating system on my blog. :)

Dr Blood said...

That was a very original and unique way of comparing the two films. Good stuff. I just thought Insidious was a bad version of Poltergeist with all the genders changed though.

B.STANK said...

Great post! This movie is so overloaded with cliches and ripoffs. When I saw the twin girls I almost fell out of my seat!

And when they get into their original idea of "The Further", it just falls flat and comes off as ridiculous.

Aside from the original SAW, I think Wan & Whannell are seriously overrated.

I love how you have Midnight The Stars And You playing on your page...nice job!

James Gracey said...

I can't wait to see this. Word of mouth has been very positive and some of those images (particularly the one with the figure standing in the corer of the kid's bedroom) are SO creepy! I have high hopes, and seem to have avoided most of the hype surrounding it - save for the odd article in the likes of Fangoria... Which I'm sure will help. :)

Christine Hadden said...

Dr. Blood & B.Stank: While there are a lot of obvious similarities between Insidious and several other films, those OTHER films are ones I truly enjoyed, in particular The Exorcist, The Shining, and Poltergeist. Which in turn, makes me more appreciative of Insidious I think, instead of calling it a rip-off. I enjoyed it, actually - despite the comparisons. Parts of it gave me some chills, so I'm going to give it a pass.

James: I think you'll like it as well. Like I said, there are a lot of parallels akin to several other movies, but it's still freaky - in particular the first half. The more you DON'T see the better, as always.
Yeah, you'll like it :)

Anonymous said...

Kubrick really should've copyrighted those twins. Well spotted comparisons. It all begs the question: when does homage become outright rip-off?

Christine Hadden said...

Helva: Though I truly did enjoy the film, I still feel as though I had seen a lot of it before. Parts of it gave me chills - but then again, so did the films it was patterned after. So what does that mean? :)

Kaijinu said...

is it me, or is that one wit the figure standing next to the bed kinda resembles Freddy krueger...