To fully contextualize my feelings on Insidious: The Red Door, I kind of have to explain my feelings on all the previous films. You get multiple reviews for the price of one here, reader. Congrats!

The Blueprint for Modern Horror

Insidious struck just the right balance of enjoyable, atmospheric ghost film with a grounded family drama, and despite some silly editing, you can understand why it did gangbusters at the box office. It became the blueprint for ghost/demon films for a while, and for good reason. Insidious Chapter 2 brought some fresh Blumhouse cash which enhanced the cinematography, mainly in the set design and audio, but it also expanded on the lore of the world and made for an even better film than the first. Insidious 3 was…bad but admittedly redeemed in some respects by the worldbuilding done in Insidious: The Last Key, which is enjoyable and gives us all what we wanted: even more Lin Shaye as Elise Rainier. 

Insidious: The Red Door A Worthy Finale?

So, Insidious: The Red Door being the final mainline installment for the foreseeable future is appropriate, as it reflects the track record of all the films thus far: it’s got its problems, but it’s still undeniably great, and supplements all its shortcomings with a flood of expertly executed scares as you’ve come to expect from the franchise. 

Insidious: The Red Door follows the events of Insidious: Chapter 2 directly (well, as direct as a nine-year gap can be). With the Lambert family trying to forget the demons and spirits of the Further, eldest son Dalton (Ty Simpkins) moves away for his first year of college. Despite their best efforts, he and his father, Josh (Patrick Wilson), begin to experience the return of supernatural activity. As the clock runs down, the two must deal with their hypnotically repressed memories and end the madness that has plagued them for almost a decade.  

Patrick Wilson’s Directorial Debut Shines

Behind the camera, we get the directorial debut of Patrick Wilson, who in coordination with cinematographer Autumn Eakin makes a very aesthetically pleasing film. The natural and supernatural realms they show us knock it out of the park thanks to this production and some bespoke set design. This is the best the Further has looked in all of the movies, and the return to a very familiar location from previous entries was so perfectly executed that I started smiling in the theatre when I saw it. The return of a fan-favorite villain also gives us a redesign that feels like the truest version of them and makes them the scariest they’ve ever been. There’s an undeniable element of nostalgia in how this film emulates its predecessor’s style. That nostalgia comes from a true understanding of what makes these movies effective. 

The Horror That Defines Insidious

The greatest strength of the Insidious movies technically has always been its use of shadow and playing with empty space in the frame to build tension. Moving the camera around slowly, and just when you think you’ve pinned down a pattern, it gets a bombastic jumpscare over you while trying to anticipate where it’s coming from. They codified this for all the other horror movies of the 2010s, so of course, the scares are still exceptional in this one. Add onto this Joseph Bisharra’s unmistakable score, which gives you the middle point where dissonant strings meet creaking naturalistic noise, and it scratches your brain just right. These factors work together harmoniously, and you get some all-around grade-A cinematography. 

Writing Woes: A Rocky Start

Beyond technical strengths… there’s a little trouble in paradise. I will get all my complaints about the writing out of the way quickly to talk about everything I like in the film’s story. The dialogue is distractingly lackluster early on (see the laughably aggro art professor and the most fratboy fratboy of all time). The film tries its hand at humor quite a bit more than the originals did with Tucker and Specs, to its detriment. While a couple of the jokes hit, the rest fall flat early on, even if they’re delivered by good actors. While the film’s second and third acts are well-done and exceptional, the first act is pretty bad in the face of some of the well-done scares. 

A Profound Father-Son Story

The rest of the film I love because it’s none of that. It’s a dramatic and weirdly profound story of a father and son that melds perfectly with the series’ trademark horror. It impacted me even more than the story of the first film. Those who have rewatched the series recently know Josh as a character who never got to develop beyond being the beleaguered skeptic father in the first movie, then being sidelined in the second as he spends the entire runtime possessed by Parker Crane, aka the Woman in Black. 

Insidious: The Red Door takes time to explore the implications of those movies and how Josh spent them. Instead of disturbing some wonderful homelife they earned through their previous struggle, this film puts us back in the tumult of a family haunted by their past. The weight of the first two films is felt in a major way, and it’s appreciated that picking back up after two mostly unrelated films in the series and so many years hasn’t hampered that feeling. Time, and absence, have made the story of the Lambert family grow fonder. 

Wilson and Simpkins Shine

Much of the emotional weight this time is carried by Josh, and Wilson plays the character with the same level of depth Rose Byrne afforded Renai in the first and second movies; that is to say, he’s impressive and feels incredibly genuine. The other actor who gets the lion’s share of screen time is Simpkins, playing a now grown-up Dalton (do you feel old yet?). He doesn’t get to interact much with Foster like I had hoped, or his mother Renai, who is back home for most of the film. But, if they did get to interact, it would defeat the purpose of making the audience experience the isolation Dalton’s been through and continues to go through. He does have his roommate Chris, who is played by the very charismatic Sinclair Daniel, and the two have some decent onscreen chemistry. All the movie’s players are enjoyable, but the film absolutely glows in the interactions we get between Josh and Dalton, culminating in a very touching moment between the two and the best climax of the series. 

Tackling Generational Trauma with Horror

While many movies as of late have made it popular to drop a true tangible villain in favor of a horror that hits closer to home, the inscrutable evil of generational trauma, this movie surprised me the most in how well it handled it. Not to say the threats from the Further aren’t still there, and still scary; just that the emotional damage this film shows us is a whole other challenge in and of itself. And if none of that interests you, we’ve also got some gnarly spirits from that astral dimension beyond. One of them gave me a nasty scare that made my jaw drop in the theatre. If you gag easily, wait for this one to be out on VOD. But if you’ve got the guts for it, you should go to the theatre immediately. 

Here’s hoping the upcoming spin-off, Thread: An Insidious Tale, lives up to the hype just as well.

Does Insidious: The Red Door Deliver?

After a fat 10-year gap, does Insidious: The Red Door give a satisfying conclusion to the open-door ending of Chapter 2? More than any fan would anticipate. A sloggy first act and some poorly placed humor should not drive you away from what is a lovingly crafted finale for the Lamberts that is shockingly heartfelt despite being able to scare the hell out of you. This is now my second favorite film in the entire series, so believe me when I say you should take one more journey into the Further and watch it this weekend.