Insidious [4]: The Last Key (2018) [Blu-ray]
Horror | Mystery | Thriller

Parapsychologist Dr. Elise Rainier faces her most fearsome and personal haunting yet, as she is drawn back to her ghostly childhood home, where the terror began - in her own family home.

Storyline: The parapsychologist Dr. Elise Rainier has nightmares with her childhood in New Mexico, where she lived with her brother Christian, her supportive mother Audrey and her father Gerald, who frequently beats her when she claims that she sees ghosts everywhere in the house. When the client Ted Garza calls Elise to ask for help since he is haunted since he moved to a house in New Mexico, Elise refuses the request since the address is the same house where she spent her childhood. However she changes her mind and accepts the job, and travels with her assistants Specs and Tucker to New Mexico where they will discover an evil entity in the house. Written by Claudio Carvalho, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Reviewer's Note: Reviewed by Martin Liebman, April 2, 2018 One can only hope that the word "last" appearing in the title actually refers to the "last" movie in the Insidious series, which has become something of a mainstay in the Horror genre. Built more around atmosphere than gore, more around characters than chills, the films have not exactly evolved over time, but neither have they significantly devolved. They have instead become the hamster wheel of the movie world, feverishly spinning around the same place but never really accomplishing anything or going anywhere. They follow the same formula of paranormal investigation and travel into another realm by the third act. The series started well and felt enjoyably unique and stylish, declined with the second, and scratched and clawed its way back to respectability with the third. Insidious: The Last Key sees the series drop again, though as with the second film it's more a steady, gentle decline than it is a plummet. The Last Key's biggest offense is its inability to do anything different, though the focus is, admittedly, not so much on the paranormal but rather its protagonist Elise, exploring her youth and returning her to her roots, allowing the audience to witness what it is that made her into the franchise's main character.

Medium Elise Rainier (Lin Shaye) receives a call from a man named Ted Garza (Kirk Acevedo), who pleads that she come to his New Mexico home to rid it of a demon. Elise, however, refuses his request. It turns out he lives at the house she called home as a child, a house of horrors, for her, where her father beat her, mercilessly, and locked her in the basement, regularly, in an effort to subdue and eliminate her power to communicate with the world she would come to know as The Further. But she ultimately relents and makes the journey with her trusted companions, Tucker and Specs (Angus Sampson and Leigh Whannell). She will have to battle her own dark secrets, face her own personal fears, and confront her own demons in her most challenging, and personal, mission yet.

The film deals in both basic Horror tropes and established franchise structure. Its deviation from either is near zero. Its purpose isn't to reinvent the genre or franchise wheel but rather to dig into its past and shine a light on Elise, exploring her psychic powers in greater detail by returning her to her roots in a run-down New Mexico home where her own past is darker than The Further and her father more of a monster than the demons she can see. But that's also a problem. It's not so much that the film builds the backstory, it's that it does nothing interesting with it. The abusive father angle does nothing to help distinguish the character or differentiate the franchise from many others. It takes the easy way out, giving Elise a basic, paint-by-numbers backstory, putting all the pieces in place in the first ten minutes and simply plowing through predictable happenings and revelations the rest of the way forward. The film, to its credit, does work hard to not only build her story but also explore some of the connective tissues between this film and previous entries. It's franchise fan service, capable of adding and exploring, but without much creativity or gut-punch twists and turns.

The acting and script both leave much to be desired. Lin Shaye exhibits little energy in the role, even as it's a very personal journey, returning to her home, bearing witness to past secrets reborn, and coming to better understand who she is what role her past and present play in the story and the dark realm of The Further. Even series staples Specs and Tucker, portrayed by Leigh Whannell and Angus Sampson, are their typical selves, bumbling buffoons who fawn over a pair of pretty girls and trip over their own words, but capable when push comes to shove and very loyal to Elise. Atmospherically, the film is fine, again not particularly novel in terms of either the franchise's established visual patterns of the Horror genre in general. The film does boast the typically strong makeup and digital effects, though it's more reliant on sharp musical cue jump scares and lighting than it is actual frights derived from the story.

Insidious: The Last Key is one of those movies that largely defies the critical process. It's made for its pre-built audience, digs deeper into the foundational lore, and hits all of the series' high notes that fans expect. Essentially, it dances with the audience that brought it. It's fan service, and it works well enough in that regard. Those who enjoy the series will probably like it, and those who have yet to watch an Insidious movie more than likely won't start here and will know well before they reach the fourth film whether they'll want to watch it. Sony's Blu-ray struggles through some of its darker scenes, but video quality is otherwise good. Audio is strong and the supplements are fine. Recommended to franchise fans.

[CSW] -2.3- A reviewer said "Recommended to franchise fans." This is completely true because if you don't remember all of the preceding three Insidious films a lot of this won't make complete sense to you. It can be taken as a stand-alone film but loses quite a bit of meaning without those deeper connections to the earlier films. Fortunately there is an extra on the rented disc version called "Dive Into the Insidious Universe" that "spoils shit real fast" by recapping the entire series. If you haven't watched or don't remember the earlier films it is actually worth watching before you watch the feature film. I wish I had, even though it covers the plot lines of the previous films so fast that they don't truly sink in. It might be great for those just refreshing their memory. This film is just so-so for non-franchise fans but actually pretty good for those who are.
[V3.5-A4.0] MPEG-4 AVC - No D-Box


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