Shocktober - Sinister (2012)

“Don’t worry, Daddy. I’ll make you famous again.” – Ashley

So far, I’ve kept the horror quotient on a more humorous level in the hope that Shocktober is a fun event. But let’s not forget that a horror festival needs a shot of actual horror as well. And with that in mind, this time, the screams might be real – they might be yours. Sinister is a Blumhouse production from 2012 which packs a punch. It has some jump scares, but also carries a heavy atmosphere of mounting dread. This might be the most unnerving movie I’ve chosen for this year’s Shocktober.

Ethan Hawke stars as Ellison Oswalt, a true crime writer who has in the past, we discover, courted controversy with his first book as it led to the conviction of a killer by uncovering evidence the police had missed. All his subsequent books have failed miserably after the best-selling debut. He’s looking for that elusive one more hit that’ll resurrect his career. Practically broke, he’s moved his family to a new home, and none of them seem particularly thrilled. With him are his long-suffering wife Tracy (Juliet Rylance) and his kids; son Trevor (Michael Hall D’Addrio) and daughter Ashley (Clare Foley).

It’s no wonder that Tracy appears a little weary of tolerating Ellison’s bull, even though she’s as supportive of his pursuit of his dreams as she possibly can be. There’s a small detail she hasn’t been told about the new house. She knows that Ellison has moved to this area to research a new book. She DOESN’T know that the crimes he’s researching, specifically the murder of a family have actually happened on the property.

Ellison discovers a box in the attic containing reels of Super 8 films and a projector. He also discovers and squashes a scorpion, and later he discovers a snake up there, which slithers quickly away. (He’s remarkably cool about there being an escaped snake somewhere in the house. I’d be tearing the walls down looking for it or any more of them. I wouldn’t be sleeping until I knew without a shadow of a doubt where it was – out of the house and far away.)

What he’s discovered (other than the house is a shelter for venomous critters) is basically a stash of snuff home movies. The titles on the reels are innocuous enough, referring to family pool parties, gardening activities, barbecues – all normal sounding. But they all lead to the graphically nasty deaths of all concerned, with the exception of one child from each family. The first film from the box he screens for himself in his study shows the execution by hanging of the previous family to occupy his house, from a tree in the yard.

He abandons an urge to call the police about his discovery, thinking he has another case that he can crack for his next bestseller. This is one of several huge mistakes he makes in the movie. The most basic being not turning the damn lights on in his house at night. I mean, the place is dark enough in the day – at night it’s worse. I know they’re broke, but damn – wandering along darkened halls and entering pitch black rooms that seem to have no available light sources – especially when the truth of what he’s messing with begins to reveal itself. It’s not the serial killer story he thinks it is, it’s darker and way more sinister than

On the films, he spots a shadowy figure and a strange symbol. Further, he discovers a child’s drawing inside the lid of one of the canisters depicting the killings and someone called Mr Boogie. Consulting an occult expert, he realises that he’s dealing with a supernatural entity the early Christians called Bughuul, who lures children away from safety to do his bidding – i.e. kill their families. The scorpion and snake Ellison spotted are two of Bughuul’s symbols, and in those overly dark rooms, Ellison is being watched by the ghosts of the children who killed their families, and are influencing Ashley to do the same.

You might be curious how Ellison got himself targeted by the whole Bughuul cult (he’s also known as The Eater of Children). Well, evidence points to a chain that goes back as far as they’ve discovered, which is 1966 but probably centuries further. Each of the slaughtered families has lived in the property last owned by the previous family to fall victim. So, Bughuul waits until the next family along moves in and they become the next targets. But…there’s something he doesn’t know yet. Something important.

Tormented by the ghostly kids who provide some excellent jump scares – and this comes from someone who normally loathes them – Ellison moves his family out.

Now, on to that “but” a paragraph ago – the pattern suggests that the family is only killed when they flee the house where their torment began, at the new home.

The youngest child, in this case Laura, will brutally kill the whole family and film it – leaving the Super 8 reel and a projector for the next occupants to find – and it all starts again.

This was the second time in several years that I had screened this movie, and it still packed a punch. Apart from the thickening sense of absolute menace and evil, there are two superb scares that will push your freak-out meter into the red. One has the still image of Baghuul on Ellison’s laptop, but when he looks away, the image moves and is watching him. The other is in a dark room and one of the ghost children suddenly appears, looking over his shoulder before vanishing again.

The whole notion of the youngest child slaughtering the entire family is creepiness and truly disturbing taken to a whole new level, and this film expertly exploits that primal terror of being murdered by your own young children to a whole new level.

If I was to recommend a REALLY scary movie to watch in the dark after the children have gone to bed this Halloween, make it this one. (But make sure they’re in bed – okay? We don’t want them getting ideas.)