Talk about stepping out of your place. A crime author goes a little overboard in his research in Scott Derrickson’s “Sinister.” When Ethan Hawke’s Ellison Oswalt as he becomes preoccupied in a case involving a missing girl, which he hopes to write about, the choices he then makes are stupid and rash and the consequences of his obsession are horrifying — but at least horror fans enjoyed it.

His lust to write a book became unquenched. Oswalt forced his family to move  to a new town so that he can properly investigate the case, but what he didn’t tell upfront to his wife (Juilet Rylance) was that the house they moved into was in fact the house in which he murder of four family members and a child stolen had occurred. However, the wife becomes suspicious from the haunted looks of the neighbors and the unwelcoming sheriff (Fred Thompson) who flat-out told Oswalt he wasn’t a fan of his books and gave him the vibe that he doesn’t want him here.

But rule one or two about horror movies is that usually the cop can’t do anything in the film. The cop had no effect, but Oswalt was about to get himself into a huge mess that would make him wish he had listened to the cop, but what’s the fun in that? I mean, you gotta love stupid characters suffering for their stupid decisions!

Oswalt finds a bunch of tapes in a box, and finds out that they’re family recordings — more gruesome than the typical kind. In each tape there is a different family and each recording shows their unique, odd murder. Instead of being the wiser man and turning in the tapes he spends his late nights studying the films trying to draw a connection to each mysterious murder.

Oswalt becomes increasingly disturbed with the horrible footage he sees, but things become to shift into a more chilling film when an invisible intruder begins to leave behind messages in his home that are clues relating back into the crime. The unseen being becomes increasingly terrifying and turns more dangerous with every visit. Oswalt must figure out what exactly caused the murders and more importantly figure out what he’s going to do before his family is next…

Now, the movie definitely has a lot of thrill to it, but yes there is that common factor in horror movies where a bloodthirsty murderer is inside a house and the victim refuses to turn on the lights. Not going to lie, there were many main character dumb moments that made me want to do a table flip, such as pointing a butcher blade towards yourself when there’s something wanting to kill you. The scares were great and entertained the audience throughout the film though there was a few unnecessary jumpy scenes.
“Sinister” is probably one of the better of the horror movies released right now. It is rated R for disturbing violent images and some horror, with a running time of 109 minutes.

by KALEEN SINGH