Insidious (2011)

American-made horror flicks, especially ones rated PG-13, are a dime-a-dozen and pointless as alcohol-free beer. The urge to shock and cut a swath through the audience is undone by the need to ensure 12-year-olds can get in. “Insidious” is an exception. Dig it: Ghosts and ghouls rule your new dream house, but it isn’t the home that’s haunted. It’s your child. Spooky. That’s the premise that drives our parent heroes (Patrick Wilson and Rose Byrne) to tumble desperate into the arms of some ghost busters straight out of “Poltergeist.” Dig it further: Imagine, guys, coming home to see our wife talking to your own mother … and a priest. (I’d shit myself.) As with “Poltergeist,” what we don’t see is the real shocker, not blasé gore. The rating lulled me in, and the film whacked me on the head, “Sixth Sense” style. Too many scenes at the end are dark to the point of murky (and baffling) confusion, and the villain is murkier, but “Insidious” had me up at 3 a.m., listening for spooked baby monitors we do not own. B