Previously, Wan earned $100 million on a $1.5 million investment with Insidious. His latest, The Conjuring, looks scary enough to earn all the money. Stars Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga (who don’t appear in this trailer) play a husband and wife team of ghost hunters investigating a remote farmhouse. They quickly learn that they are in over their heads when the supernatural activity grows more and more violent. I’m really impressed by the hide and seek sequence featured in this trailer. Suppose you’re a ghost and a new family moves into your house and immediately starts playing hide and seek while blindfold. How can you not f**k with them? This ghost, though, just takes it to an amazing level. It deserves our respect.

This film was originally slated for January 2013 release but due to resounding praise from audiences, the film was pushed back to August to rake in those sweet, sweet summer dollars.

It looks like the movie is going to be one of those “based on a true story wink wink” haunted house deals, like The Amityville Horror. Wilson previously worked with Wan on Insidious, but Farmiga is new to the Guy Who Did Saw Club. They will be playing a married pair of “demonologists” who take on the case of their lives, whatever, loud noises, demons, shadows, you know the deal. I hope it’s good! (The Hollywood Reporter)

7 photosRose Byrne

Wan will make actors react to loud noises in The Conjuring. The story is based on the real life story of the Perron family who encountered both friendly and benevolent spirits in their Rhode Island farmhouse. This is a change of pace that I endorse. For the most part, ghosts seem like dicks but I’d definitely welcome a friendly one into my house. Would be nice to see a cup of coffee floating toward me each morning. (Variety)

Cast: Patrick Wilson, Rose Byrne, Barbara Hershey, Angus Sampson

Synopsis: A family looks to prevent evil spirits from trapping their comatose child in a realm called The Further.

Release Date: April 1, 2011

Insidious is his fourth directorial film. Also written by Saw and Silence writer Leigh Whannell, this ghost story takes a family into a realm beyond the afterlife. The Further is where human souls exist when they leave their bodies. At South by Southwest, Wan and I discussed the SXSW premiere of Insidious and the films that have emerged since our last meeting.

Q: Is The Further a concept in spirituality or metaphysics that you guys studied?

James Wan: It’s interesting because I don’t know how it is for Leigh, but because I come from an Asian background, my dad’s side are all Christians but my mom’s side are all Buddhist. Growing up in an Asian upbringing, I see a bit of both worlds. In a lot of Asian culture, superstition and spirituality plays a big part, especially in Buddhism. So it’s always something that has always been in the back of my mind and I remember pitching Leigh a particular old wives tale that I’ve heard from my grandmother about people going to sleep and your soul leaves your body when you sleep and the idea is they say never paint or draw on someone’s face when they’re sleeping, because when their soul leaves their body and they come back, they may not recognize that face and they’ll continue moving on. That sensibility I think led to what eventually would be the very tiny seed that would become Insidious.

Q: Could The Further be a place you could explore further, even without horror?

JW: From a mythological standpoint? I think it’s great and that’s the thing that Leigh and I wanted to do which is create another mythology, create our own – - we wanted to create our own scary world. Instead of calling it the Limbo or hell or heaven or whatever it is, we call it The Further. We always like doing that, taking something that you’re familiar with or you think you know and just kind of giving it a new spin to it.

Q: Do you have more mythology figured out?

JW: Yeah, we do have a fair bit figured out in terms of backstories, when he was writing it and for me when I was directing it so that I know how to direct it. It’s like acting for actors, they need to know where their characters come from to know how to perform but that doesn’t necessarily mean that the backstory needs to be on screen.

Q: But could it be if this continued as a series?

JW: Knock on wood. We’re not thinking about sequels but it definitely can. We’re literally opening up a whole different world.

Q: Where did you find the maturity to portray parents, as single men yourselves?

JW: Well, Leigh’s the one that finally got married so I think he’s now in that process of shifting over to more of a grown-up. Leigh’s no a single man I am but it’s good that he’s the writer. So for him, it was very important, he’s going through this period in his life now where he’s shifting from one phase of his life to the next phase. I really think a lot of that shows in this movie.

Q: No kids yet?

JW: No, not yet but I’m pretty sure that’s the kind of stuff that they’re talking about as you get married.

Q: Well, there are fathers and mothers who don’t portray parents that well.

JW: Right, and you know what? Very luckily I have such great actors as Patrick Wilson and Rose Byrne, to make that believable.

Q: I never got a chance to tell you how much I loved Death Sentence.

JW: Oh, cool.

Q: Are you feeling the love for that film after the fact.

JW: Yeah, I definitely didn’t feel it when the film came out but now I hear a lot. People that have seen it love the film. Especially when I do these press tours, it’s pretty incredible when I hear people that have actually seen the movie and really dig it so I’m actually very surprised.

Q: How did it feel to start a certain movement with the Saw series and then see another one take over like Paranormal Activity, from your producer Oren Peli?

JW: I think it’s great. I think movies, like anything, are like fashion. They go in and out of style but they’re out of style completely. They’re never done. People just get used to and get tired of a particular aesthetic. Then they breathe, they move onto something else and then we come back to it again. That’s how it works.

Q: I hope you’re a millionaire from the royalties to seven Saw movies. How are you supporting your lifestyle off the franchise?

JW: [Laughs] Well, it’s definitely allowed me to work. We all need to work to pay the bills, right?

Q: Leigh always said Dr. Gordon died after cutting his foot off. What was the conversation when they said they were doing Saw VII with Cary Elwes, and here’s how it ends?

JW: Interesting. As the director of the first Saw only, I always wanted the fate of Dr. Gordon and the fate of Adam (Leigh Whannell) to be unknown. We slam the door on Leigh’s character, you presume he’d probably die because there’s no one there to help him but you don’t see it. Dr. Gordon crawls out and you never know what happens. I really wanted to just leave it at that.

SXSW offered a first look at the premiere of the new James Wan/Leigh Whannell film Insidious. My first thoughts were a bit of self-reflection. I have to appreciate horror movies on a different level than the target audience. I’m not scared by ghosts and monsters and slasher killers. I can appreciate it as a story, and often some deep fantasy, but I’m not scared. Insidious has enough that should scare the horror believers and creates an in-depth mythology that objective viewers like me can respect.

Renee (Rose Byrn) and Josh (Patrick Wilson) move into a new house where apparitions pop up behind windows and push books off the shelves. Their son Dalton falls into a coma. That’s a taboo plot twist that Hollywood horror wouldn’t allow. The visions get stronger and Renee experiences them the most.

The scares at this point are solid. You see enough unsettling disturbances, some grinning twins or a bloody handprint on the sheets, to get your Shining on. Here is where the film gets smart though. They move out of the house. Josh may be skeptical but he’s willing to do it for Renee’s well being.

Of course, it wasn’t the house, it was the family. In the new house, the ghosts get more interactive. A ghostly child actually makes Renee play hide and seek. Josh’s mom Lorraine (Barbara Hershey) calls a spiritual advisor, Elise (Lin Shaye) to help. That’s when the mythology gets deep.

Elise explains astral projection to create a really mature, perceptive view of the supernatural. Leigh Whannell’s script incorporates spiritual powers and philosophy that even casual readers of pop metaphysics would appreciate. Elise and her assistants Tucker (Angus Sampson) and Specs (Leigh Whannell) can’t stop the other world from causing trouble so the pace builds as the mythology develops.

Elise introduces the concept of The Further, which the film explores as a new vision of the world beyond our own. It’s more dreamlike than Nightmare on Elm Street and full of unsettling images and sound. The characters aren’t passive. Renee and Josh get hands on to save their son. Josh has to be the nay sayer but they make him reasonable.

I was most interested when the film kicked into its spiritual gear, but the whole film is well done. James Wan shoots the houses so that every angle on a room or staircase makes it look completely different. He reveals the disturbing elements in effective tracking shots, obscuring some things and playing with screen space. It’s not just jump scares.

I was invested in the otherworldly adventure of Insidious, which is definitely more epic than the usual haunted house story. I would look forward to further adventures in The Further.

These days, you can’t have a horror movie without a frightening, possessed child. Has there ever been a horror movie about a spooky orphanage of possessed kids? You know, why am I even asking? There have probably been hundreds.

Here’s the new poster for Insideous by director James Wan (Saw), which is admittedly pretty freaky looking. It’s about “a family [who] tries [to] prevent evil spirits from trapping their comatose son in a realm called The Further forever.” Yikes. I hear The Further is, like, one of the worst realms ever. It’s got a pretty lousy review on Yelp.

Check out the poster below, along with some screenshots from the film. We’ve also got the trailer here. This April, get ready to catch your shrieking girlfriend as she cowers in your arms at the theater, then will have “thank god everything’s okay in real life” sex with you when you get home. (FirstShowing, Dread Central)

I’m told that the film, though formulaic, really delivers on scares. To me, it looks like a really scary version of “Ghosthunters,” which could be a cool premise. Noticing strange goings-on, concerned parents of a creepy kid hire paranormal investigators, only to discover it’s not their house that’s haunted but their son. Why they don’t leave the kid in the supermarket parking lot a few towns over is beyond me.

The movie stars Rose Byrne, Patrick Wilson, Barbara Hershey, and apparently the ghost of Darth Maul. Good to see him working again.

All snark reluctantly aside, this actually sounds like it might be promising, judging from this quote from Wan in the press release:

“I wanted to have the creative freedom and the ability to work with really artistic film makers who can help me bring an original and innovative style of genre films to the public. Paradigm paved the way for this and we have chosen to partner with Icon who are a perfect fit for us.”

The first movie of this set is going to be House of Horror, based on a story idea by Wan. Who knows, maybe a couple of these movies won’t annoyingly spawn a million sequels and make me hate it perhaps unjustifiably. (via SlashFilm)

*I instantly regret that pun. Please forgive me.

(The Playlist)

We won’t have to wait much longer to see Rose Byrne get chased around by a ghost that looks like a cross-dressing Michael Myers. Saw director James Wan is back in the horror game after taking a few years off. He’s re-teamed with Leigh Whannell for Insidious, a haunted house story about a couple who fight to prevent evil spirits from trapping their comatose child in a realm called The Further.

The film will open April 1st after positive festival reactions. Many critics were abuzz about Rose Byrne and Patrick Wilson‘s portrayal of the parents. I don’t really know if that ghost is supposed to be scary. I’m getting more of a Bubbe vibe than cursed succubus that will drag your first-born to an eternity of Detroit Hell. (Coming Soon)