Sinister schminister (a review of the film)

True crime writer Ellison Oswalt (obnoxious name, who'd call a kid Ellison? just kill him now) had a hit in the nineties with his book 'Kentucky Blood' and, much like a drug addict, he has been Kentucky fried craving just one more after the following years resulted in very modest success. Desperate, he uproots his oblivious family, not just to a new town, but to the very house where the brutal and calculated murder of a whole family took place.

"I love my whole family to death. Literally, you just wait bitch."

The wonderful Ethan Hawke takes the lead as Oswalt, a man willing to sacrifice anything for another 15 minutes in the limelight; his marriage and his children come second to his wants and desires, even when he finds a mysterious box of snuff films in the attic. Who put it there? Who killed all of these families? You will never guess. Seriously, you won't. If this had gone down the serial killer route, it would have made for a fairly decent movie, but seeing that it was created by the producer of Paranormal Activity, shits about to get ridiculous.

Beats American Idol any day.

Having found the box, Oswalt takes it to his office and plays the super 8 films on a projector. Cue lots of rubbing of the chin, squinting eyes and downing of whiskey as our hero witnesses family murder after family murder. The deaths themselves, shown in a grainy and old fashioned style, are uncomfortable to watch yet intriguing. This is no crazed lunatic out on a stroll with an axe/chainsaw/gun that saw an opportunity and took it, these murders were well thought out, almost artistic.

"What did our family do at the weekend? Oh, you know, just hung around in the garden."

For example, the unfortunate family that were murdered in Oswalt's new home were hung from a tree in the back garden from a snapped branch and a pulley that lifted them from the ground into a desperate but ultimately futile battle to survive. They kick their feet, jerk their bodies, then one by one go limp before the film finishes.Another family are taped to sun loungers and yanked into a swimming pool one by one from a rope. While watching these horrible sights, Oswalt continues to glug away while writing extremely obvious notes such as: 'Who made this film?' and 'Where's Stephanie?'

Stephanie is the missing child of the murdered family, a child that the police have already given up hope of finding as they occupy their time sneering at Oswalt for showing up the mistakes of their cop bredren in his previous books. Maybe if they did their job properly instead of shrugging their shoulders over a missing child and whiling away their time dicking about bickering with a writer or dishing out speeding tickets they wouldn't have anything to worry about. As it stands, the cops have missed out on what is really going on in that old house, big time, and should indeed be very worried.

It turns out that these reels, dating back to 1966, all have the same symbol displayed and same creepy figure in the background that reminds me a little of Jigsaw or a secret band member of Hollywood Undead. He first appears in the reflection of the pool, a shadowy, pale, alien face, and then in the bushes; still blurred, still mysterious and terrifying. Confused and brown in the pants by these findings, does Oswalt ever think to call the police at the potential of a masked serial killer messing around with him? No. Not even when he starts hearing weird noises in his house, or when his kids start behaving in a manner that would usually result in some sort of therapy (the boy develops night terrors that result in one of the biggest jump-inducing moments in modern horror films, while the daughter starts painting strange figures of murder and boogie men in contrast to her earlier paintings of unicorns and joy).

I consume children even though I have no mouth. Your argument is invalid.

Later in the film Oswalt turns to a rookie cop and fan of 'Kentucky Blood' for information, who also puts him in contact with a deity and myth something or other know-it-all, which leads to the pieces coming together. I didn't fully pay attention at this point because I knew the route the film was going and I'm not big on the fantastical, but it is along the lines of a Pagan deity, called Bagul, that is using recorded images as a way to move through time and consume children after potentially possessing them or getting them to do his bidding of murdering their whole family.With this knowledge would you run away and never look back, think screw the book deal, the potential movie deal, the fame and the glory, I love the survival and sanity of my family and myself more? I would, but does Oswalt? Of course not.

We've been playing fancy dress with mummy's make up box.

Although I wasn't a major fan of the whole clay-faced kids running about and making creaky noises turn the movie took, or even the later over-use of what was at first a genuinely creepy and mysterious horror movie villain, I did find the soundtrack and effects genuinely uncomfortable and tension inducing. The use of lighting, particularly around Oswalt as he kept secrets from his family and walked deeper into the shadows of his own egotism and selfishness, was also effective. Sadly it couldn't save my opinion of the film overall. Even the ending, with Oswalt and his family axed to death by the artistic daughter, didn't stop me feeling dissapointed. Too many cheap scares, too much of a good thing with Bagul, too many kids caked with make-up running about trying to be scary, and definitely too much over-acting from the amateur daughter in this scene:

If I bend my neck like this and stare into space everyone will shit themselves

Sinister indeed had elements that were sinister, the snuff films in particular looked disturbingly realistic, and the behaviour of a desperate father and husband sacrificing the safety of his family for his own needs gave the film depth, but ultimately the supernatural twist ruined the potential of what could have been an excellent thriller/slasher in the same vein as The Strangers. What a bagul of old bollocks.

For now Ethan, adieu. I await the sequel of the magnificent Before Sunset with baited breath.