Review of Sinister (2012) by Johnny T — 17 Aug 2013

The movie makes up for uneven dialogue and pacing issues through sheer horrific imagery. Rather than another drearily workaday horror picture, Sinister uses the supernatural to underline its examination of the all-too-human foibles of insecurity and myopic self-centeredness. I knew perfectly well, after a while, what Sinister was going to scare me with. But I got scared anyway. As the best horror stories so often do, Sinister makes clear that we are our own boogeymen, the worst monsters of all. Hawke's taut performance - lightly parodying his own career doldrums while playing an egotistical hack who's a close cousin of John Cassavetes's self-loathing actor in Rosemary's Baby - is totally credible. And then there is Vincent D'Onofrio, as a university professor of the occult and mythological, who opens up a line of possibility that eventually saves the ending from being a red herring. Yes, the ending is horrifying, but I don't believe in that stuff. I'm pretty sure I don't. Even though the ending is inescapable (and therefore predictable), that does little to diminish its effectiveness.

VERDICT: "In The Zone" - [Mixed Reaction] These kinds of movies are usually movies that had some good things, but some bad things kept it from being amazing. This rating says buy an ex-rental or a cheap price of the DVD to own. If you consider cinema, ask for people's opinion on the film... (Films that are rated 2.5 or 3 stars).