SINISTER

Graphic images disturb audience members

By Suzie Setzler and Krysti Peacock

With Halloween around the corner, we are more than giddy to expose ourselves to the film, which many critics were saying was one of the best horror films released thus far. Yet, after succumbing to two hours of disturbing graphic images and a main character that we deem, was nothing short of an ignorant idiot, we beg to differ.

“Sinister” follows true-crime novelist, Ellison Oswalt (Ethan Hawke) as he moves his family into a home, where the previous family had been hung; An unsolved crime that will become the basis for his next book. As he begins to unpack and sort through the home, he discovers a box of Super8 movies in the attic. Upon viewing the footage, he soon realizes they are reels of previous murders, coincidently, much like the fate of the family he is focusing on. But even more disturbing is the ungodly presence of an entity that seems to have been awoken the minute the projector came alive.

What we will say positive about this film is Hawke’s performance is spot on. He definitely carries the movie and seems to encompass a ‘writer gone mad,’ brilliantly. However, the problem lives in who he portrays, as his character is so unlikeable for his actions, that it’s hard to muster any sympathy for his mishaps. How about moving down the street from the crime scene, rather than in the actual home? These are the distressing thoughts that plagued us through the film, and we couldn’t help but be irritated by this notion.

And then there is the evil unleashed by the playback of the Super8 films. Did this evil not know that we have now moved on to HD cameras that would more than capture these disturbing images vividly? We joke. Yet, this is how implausible and unwilling we were to buy into this story. But, without a doubt, what tipped the scale unfavorably were the reels themselves. If you are squeamish and do not like seeing extremely violent graphic images played out, this film is not for you. It’s not that the film isn’t scary, but it’s that many of the scenes are too explicit for our liking. In the end, knowing we were never fans of “Insidious,” and considering we are dealing with the same producers, we’ve come to the conclusion that we are not fans of “Sinister” either.