Can you believe that the beloved horror franchise Insidious turns 11 this year? It seems like only yesterday that the trailer for Insidious appeared during the opening previews. The franchise’s director, James Wan, could not be more proud of his memorable project. Here is how Wan celebrated the 11th anniversary of Insidious.
James Wan posted on Instagram a photo of the lipstick-face demon from the horror franchise. In his caption, he said that he wanted to stay away from disturbing traps from his previous film Saw and do something with astral projection and dimension traveling. Wan and his screenwriter and actor, Leigh Whannell, decided to make their own version of a ghost story for little money in order to have creative control over the project.
After Saw, I wanted to shake the “torture-porn” label and do something less graphic and more atmospheric. Being huge fans of ghost stories and haunted houses, Leigh Whannell and I wanted to do our own version of those films, and felt we could make it for very little money to retain complete creative control. We felt the most important thing the film needed was to be scary, and so we dove into the creepy world of astral projection (a subject matter that fascinates me) and dimension-traveling.
Did you know that the original title for the project was going to be The Further? James Wan continues to go on in his post that he felt like the word “insidious” sounded more cool for a movie about ghostly possession from an entity of another dimension. Luckily, Whannell agreed and wrote a screenplay that was both scary and emotional. This haunted house genre would come back in another one of Wan’s horror franchises, The Conjuring.
This horror director continues his post by saying how fortunate he was for having the Insidious cast and crew he did for such a low-budget film. This iconic horror film was shot in 24 days and edited on his home computer using Final Cut Pro. Wan felt like he was back in his student filmmaking days as wires were all around the house during filming.
For such a low budget flick, we were very fortunate to put together a great crew and a terrific cast — the amazing Lin Shaye, Rose Byrne, Patrick Wilson (this guy!), Ty Simpkins and Barbara Hershey. We shot the whole movie in 24 days, which is 6 more than SAW! I edited it at home on my home computer (not unlike what I’m doing right now on Aquaman 2 but with a little bit more money) with Final Cut. My assistant editor, Dennis, was set up in the breakfast area, with wires running from his computer pass the kitchen to the computer Kirk and I were working on. It was truly harking back to my student filmmaking days.
It was initially rumored that a fifth movie could happen with the Insidious series. You’ll be happy to know, Insidious fans, that James Wan concluded his post by announcing the fifth movie will happen with Patrick Wilson not only starring in the movie but directing as well! This new director ought to make fans of the franchise very happy as Wilson has played the character of Josh Lambert in the first two movies. This should give him a good idea about what the world of Insidious should look like for the fifth chapter as well as staying true to the vision James Wan had given.
Be sure to check out our new movie releases so you stay up to date for when the fifth chapter of Insidious hits theaters. Like James Wan says, “long live the Further.”
