"Insidious: Chapter III" (2015)

I’ll say this, that when Blumhouse first started coming out with some of their supernatural thrillers (like the original “Insidious” and “Sinister”), I was all on board. After having endured ten years or so of so-called “torture porn” films, I was happy to see mainstream horror moving away from that and towards something that would hopefully leave more to the imagination. The problem is, I think many of these filmmakers have hit the limit as far as imagination goes for this sub-genre and “Insidious: Chapter III” feels like a glaring example. 

While I will commend the film for trying to use a more subdued approach with this entry (especially after all the confusing and chaotic plot lines in “Chapter II”), the biggest problem is it never seems to provide any genuine sense of creepiness that the original (and to a lesser extent, its sequel) had in spades. In fact, by this point it all feels like an old hat, and first time director Leigh Wannell seems more focused on creating jump scares than telling a cohesive story. I never really felt like I knew who the main character was, as the first half seems like it’s following Stefanie Scott’s character, while the second half switches focus by giving us a back story to Lin Shaye’s psychic character from the first two films. Add to that a ghostly villain who we never really learn anything about, nor what his intentions are, to where all we do know about him is he’s bad (and that he has a breathing mask, which seemed an odd choice for a ghost to be wearing).

Then there’s the script, which is not only thin in terms of plot, but the dialog is atrocious at points (poor Lin Shaye having to say cringe worthy things like, “Bring it, bitch!”). Could James Wan, the director of the first two, have been able to do more with it? Possibly. Wan certainly has more experience working with actors, but with a dud of a script like this I think even he’d have a hard time getting them to sell such awful lines. Although, Wan does like to move the camera around, which in films like these heightens the tension, creating a sense that anything could appear at any given moment. Wannell on the other hand, keeps most everything steady (a little TOO steady), and because of that I never felt on edge. I really wish he had used that more in his favor, by suddenly turning on his audience (though he comes close to it in one scene). As a result, I was mostly bored with the overall product and by the film’s end, I was left hoping that this will be the concluding chapter!

"Terminator: Genisys" (2015)

Today is the 14^th anniversary of “Terminator 2: Judgment Day”.  With the exception of “The Phantom Menace”, I can’t think of any other film that I was so stoked about seeing.  At that point in my life, I had a huge hard on for anything James Cameron did, as he was a movie making god in my mind and with all the previews and advance buzz, I just knew T2 was going to end up being a religious experience for me.  And lo and behold…it WAS!  Unlike “Phantom Menace”, T2 lived up to all my expectations and more.  I was so entranced with that film that I ended up seeing it at least a couple dozen times that summer.

Flash forward to last night, as I was walking into the theater to purchase a ticket for “Terminator: Genisys “, I was thinking about how I was feeling the total opposite of how I felt going into T2.  I came into this film with the lowest of expectations based on lackluster previews and less than stellar reviews.  Afterwards, as the end credits hit the screen, my first thought was not only how truly awful the film was, but also how I would never watch this again, even if my life depended on it.

The film seems to want to be a “soft reboot” and, much like J.J. Abrams’ “Star Trek”, the film quickly goes about trying to set up a whole new timeline so the franchise can have a fresh start, all while still retaining its continuity.  My question is which continuity and which timeline are we rebooting?  The film is so mired in all of these ridiculous time travel paradoxes to where none of it makes any sense and only made my head hurt.  I get that this is an alternate timeline to T1, but T2 is never fully acknowledged neither are the events of T3 and T4 as well.  But then again, those latter two sequels were also “alternate timelines”, as was the entire television series, “Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles”, so that makes this film the FOURTH time the franchise has been rebooted then.

And if you’re going to “reboot” so as to hopefully bring in younger viewers to the fold, wouldn’t you do it a way where it isn’t so grafted onto the original film?  Even as ardent a fan as I am of the first two films, I had no idea what was going on, so how could anyone new to the franchise follow it (and thanks to the PG-13 rating, I saw a lot of kids in my screening)?   The film is just a mess with all of its many plot holes, to where all I could do was sit there and wonder, “If they travelled back in time to go to one timeline, how would they end up in another?”  “Who sent this version of Arnold?”  “Who sent the T-1000 to the alternate timeline of the first film?” “How does Reese remember two different timelines of his past?”  “How does Skynet seemingly see all of the different timelines?”

The real question though is, “Why make this movie at all?”  I don’t think people were clamoring for yet another “Terminator” sequel about another terminator travelling back in time and once again establishing alternate timelines, forcing our heroes to once again have to stop Skynet from becoming self aware.  Nor did they want to see their favorite characters replaced by such dull actors (and those actors that weren’t dull, like J.K. Simmons & Matt Smith being criminally underused) and the one star they do bring back, playing a robot pushing 70.  Nor did they want to see some of the worst CGI effects muddying some rather uninspired action sequences (this film really exemplifies the need for studios to start cutting back on their over reliance on CG effects and start using more practical ones again, much the way “Mad Max: Fury Road” did).  Unlike 14 years ago today, where I was so ecstatic to see the return of the “Terminator” franchise and was shouting it’s praises from the rooftops, this time I left the theater praying that Arnold & this series as a whole won’t “be back’.