Some sequels are a complete waste of time and Sinister 2 is surely one of those. If there is a logical
way to continue a story or if a series of films have been planned and each
segment moves an epic tale along, then follow-up movies can and have had
merit. However, when a sequel is put
into production because a studio caught lighting in a bottle and simply hope to
cash in on title recognition, that’s the first step down the road to ruin.
To be sure, Scott Derrickson’s Sinister was an effective,
and at times disturbing thriller that focused on the terror of home invasion
and the mass murder of families in increasingly disturbing ways. Ciaran Foy’s follow-up does manage to
recreate the terror of this sort of trespass with home movies of equally
horrifying group homicides but gets little else right. This time out, Courtney Collins (Shannyn
Sossamon) is a mother on the run with her two sons Dylan and Zach (Robert &
Dartanian Sloan), fleeing her abusive husband (Lea Coco). They seemingly have a
stroke of good luck when a friend of hers allows them to take up residence on a
farm she owns. All is well and good, but
there’s the matter of the creepy, bordered up church on the property that we
come to find out was the site of a grisly murder involving a group of wayward
parishioners. Seems that locales such as this are nexus points for the
malevolent spirit Bhughul and his ghostly child emissaries who visit and try to
persuade others to continue the cycle of killings.
Better horror films have operated with plots flimsier than
this but Foy and his cast fail to generate any intensity where their characters
are concerned and overall the movie lacks a sense of urgency. Though barely
over ninety minutes long, the story plods along as one creepy kid ghost after
another pops up, trying to get either Dylan or Zach to off their family to
please Bhughul. There’s one visit too many, one scare too many and one beat too
many in every scene, preventing the film from building any momentum.
Without question, the family, snuff films that
each tiny specter shows in an effort to persuade the Collins’ boys are lurid
affairs that successfully get under your skin.Â
However, a dull, awkward performance from James Ransone as an ex-deputy
trying to piece together the murders from the first movie to the shenanigans of
this one certainly doesn’t help, while the lack of chemistry between him and
Sossamon proves to be the final straw for this underwritten, tepidly directed
feature.Â
This article appears in Aug 20-26, 2015.
