Sinister 2

Sinister 2
File:Sinister2Poster.jpg Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Ciaran Foy
Produced by	Jason Blum Scott Derrickson Brian Kavanaugh-Jones
Written by	C. Robert Cargill Scott Derrickson
Starring	James Ransone Shannyn Sossamon
Music by	Tomandandy
Cinematography	Amy Vincent
Edited by	Ken Blackhell
Production companies	Alliance Films Automatik Entertainment Blumhouse Productions Entertainment One IM Global Tank Caterpillar, Inc.
Distributed by	Gramercy Pictures Focus Features
Release dates	August 21, 2015 (2015-08-21)
Running time	97 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$10 million
Box office	$52.9 million

Sinister 2 (also stylized as Sinister II) is a 2015 American supernatural horror film directed by Ciaran Foy and written by Scott Derrickson and C. Robert Cargill. The sequel to the 2012 film Sinister, the film stars James Ransone, reprising his role from the original film, and Shannyn Sossamon as a mother whose sons are tormented by the ghostly children taken by Bughuul at their rural farmhouse.

The film received a nationwide release on August 21, 2015. The film has grossed over $52 million against its reported budget of $10 million.

Plot

The film opens with a family being hung up like scarecrows in a corn field with sacks over their heads and burned alive. It is revealed to be the nightmare of nine-year-old Dylan Collins, who is staying in a rural farmhouse next to a deconsecrated Lutheran church, with his twin brother Zach, and their mother Courtney (Shannyn Sossamon).

Dylan is visited nightly by a group of ghostly children, led by a boy named Milo, who force him to watch "home movies" of families being murdered in various savage ways; eaten alive by alligators while being hung upside-down above a river ("Fishing Trip"), electrocuted in a puddle of water on a kitchen floor ("Kitchen Remodel"), buried alive in the snow on Christmas Day ("Christmas Morning") and strapped to chairs with their mouths forced open and having their teeth mutilated with drills ("Dentist Appointment").

Meanwhile, Deputy So & So from the first film, who investigated the Ellison Oswalt case, is independently researching the murders connected to Bughuul, and is burning down the homes where each murder took place before another family can move into them to prevent more murders. He arrives at the farmhouse to destroy it, but is interrupted when he realizes Courtney and her sons are living there. Courtney tells him to leave because she thinks he is working with her estranged husband, who is later revealed to be abusive. He convinces her otherwise and tells Courtney he is a private investigator, and she allows him to investigate the deconsecrated church on the property where a gruesome murder took place.

Zach and Dylan's father shows up at the farmhouse with police to try and take the boys but leaves after So & So threatens them. Courtney wants to leave with the boys but So & So advises Courtney not to leave the farmhouse, knowing that each of the murders connected to Bughuul occurred only after the families had fled the homes where the previous murders had occurred. Courtney invites So & So to stay at the farmhouse, and the two develop a budding romance.

So & So meets with a professor who has come into possession of a ham radio that belonged to Professor Jonas from the previous film, who was in contact with Ellison Oswalt and has mysteriously disappeared. Zach becomes jealous of the ghostly children who visit Dylan, and insists on having their attention. They show Dylan the video of the murders which took place in the same Lutheran church on their property: a family is nailed to the floor and rats burrow through their abdomens, causing them to bleed to death ("Sunday Service"). After Dylan refuses to watch the last movie, the children turn their attention to Zach and abandon Dylan.

Courtney's abusive husband, Clint, arrives with the court ordered custody warrants he didn't have before and Courtney is forced to leave with Zach and Dylan. After finding the farmhouse empty, Deputy So & So drives to Clint's home to warn them about the danger, but Clint assaults him and threatens him with a gun, telling him if he ever comes back he will shoot So & So. The next day, Zach, as directed by Milo and the other ghost children, films Dylan learning how to play golf with Clint and Courtney. After realizing he and his family have been poisoned, Dylan contacts So & So for help.

That evening, Courtney, Dylan, and Clint are hung on scarecrow posts with sacks over their heads in the cornfield. Zach lights Clint on fire first and films him as he burns to death. So & So arrives just as Zach is about to light Dylan on fire and hits Zach with his car. He frees Courtney and Dylan and they flee into the cornfield. However, Zach has survived being hit and pursues them through the cornfield with the camera and cuts half the Deputy's fingers off with a sickle.

Inside the home, the ghost kids try to help Zach find Courtney and Dylan, tearing the house apart and knocking out Deputy So & So in the process. Just as Zach is about to kill Courtney and Dylan, So & So finally manages to break the camera, thwarting Zach's home movie, and breaking the cycle. After a desperate attempt Zach tries to search for another camera and being admonished by the ghost kids for failing to kill his family, Zach is killed by Bughuul. The house then catches fire, and Courtney, Dylan, and So & So escape.

Later, back at Deputy So & So's motel room as he is packing his things, he turns and sees the ham radio. Children's voices are heard saying "It's the kids, he gets the kids!". As the children call out Deputy So & So, Bughuul appears and the scene cuts to black.

Cast

• James Ransone as Ex-Deputy So & So
• Shannyn Sossamon as Courtney Collins
• Robert Daniel Sloan as Dylan Collins
• Dartanian Sloan as Zach Collins
• Lea Coco as Clint Collins
• Tate Ellington as Dr. Stomberg
• John Beasley as Father Rodriguez
• Lucas Jade Zumann as Milo
• Jaden Klein as Ted
• Laila Haley as Emma
• Caden M. Fritz as Peter
• Olivia Rainey as Catherine
• Nicholas King as Bughuul / "Mr. Boogie"

Production

A sequel to Sinister was announced to be in the works in March 2013, with Scott Derrickson in talks to co-write the script with C. Robert Cargill, but not to direct, as Derrickson did on the first film. On 17 April 2014, it was announced that Ciaran Foy would direct the film, and Brian Kavanaugh-Jones, Charles Layton, Xavier Marchand, and Patrice Théroux would executive produce the sequel with eOne Entertainment.

Filming

Principal photography began on 19 August 2014, in Chicago. It was shot for six weeks in locations including St. Anne and outside the village of Grant Park.

Marketing

The trailer for the film was uploaded on April 9, 2015 with the song "Hush, Hush, Hush, Here Comes the Boogieman" being a main piece in the trailer. The song depicts the boogieman as a coward.

Release

On May 20, 2015, Focus Features relaunched their Gramercy Pictures label for action, horror, and science-fiction films. Sinister 2 was one of Gramercy's new releases.

Reception

Box office

The movie opened in Italy on September 4, 2015 at No. 5, taking in $435,835.

Critical response

Review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes gives the film a rating of 13%, based on 75 reviews, with an average rating of 4/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Sinister 2 has a few ingredients that will be familiar to fans of the original; unfortunately, in this slapdash second installment, none of them are scary anymore." Metacritic gives the film a score of 32 out of 100, based on reviews from 17 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews". CinemaScore announced that audiences gave the film an average grade of "B-" on an A+ to F scale.

IGN awarded it a score of 1 out of 10, saying, "Sinister 2 is an abysmal follow-up to its predecessor. At least that film knew that less is more. And less is scarier." MoviePilot also awarded the film 1 out of 10, calling it "one of the worst horror films of the last few years."

External links

• Sinister 2 at IMDb
• Sinister 2 at Box Office Mojo
• Sinister 2 at Rotten Tomatoes
• Sinister 2 at Metacritic