Paranormal Activity

Whorticulture.com movie review of Paranormal Activity

Paranormal Activity (2009)

I was pleasantly surprised by this movie. I’d heard so many negative things about it when it came out that I made sure to steer clear, but now that the sequel is coming out I figured I’d subject myself to how terrible it was. I mean, it was SO critically panned. I didn’t know anybody who liked it. I assumed it was in the same vein as The Blair Witch Project, and God knows that was a steaming pile. But tonight, I can say I’m glad I just watched it.

Here’s what I didn’t like about it. First, you couldn’t really relate to the characters. Sure, they were a cute enough couple. They kind of make you laugh in that schmaltzy kind of way. But you never really feel bad for them for going through this because the movie makes very clear that the douchebag boyfriend is at fault. At one point they call in a psychic, and the psychic says in no uncertain terms “the worst thing you can do is try to communicate through an Ouija board. DO NOT TRY TO COMMUNICATE TO IT THROUGH A OUIJA BOARD.” So what does this idiot do? Of course, he gets a Ouija board. And shit goes down, just like you might expect. I suppose you might start to feel sorry for the girlfriend, but only because she has to deal with this idiot who completely negates any female agency in their relationship.

I also noticed there were many edits that really compromised the integrity of this film. It’s all based on the premise that this a found tape, and lots of random conversations are obviously edited. You can’t fully buy it because you see it’s being edited. It’s like in the beginning of Diary of the Dead and you learn that the girl added a soundtrack to make it more suspenseful or whatever. That’s a moronic ploy. If we pretend for a moment that this movie is for real, we still have to question why they edited the middle of conversations and not a lot of the other junk that was less necessary.

Now for what I liked about it. This is a movie that my boyfriend would hate – he jumps at loud noises even when the movie isn’t scary. This movie had enough jumps for a haunted house on Halloween. Also, I was under the impression that the sound effects in this movie were just a bunch of bangs, and that is not true. In the long list of similar nighttime scenes, a few of them really stand out. I think the first one that actually sent chills down my spine was near the beginning. It was this hideous inhuman scream, followed immediately by a loud bang. There’s also a scene where the girlfriend is grabbed by the ankle and dragged out of bed, then down the hall. That one was pretty good.

So this was pretty good, as far as scares go, but they were a bit few and far between. It worked suspense well. I wanted to eat my own face at the end, when they’ve both left the room and the seconds are just ticking, ticking, ticking away. I’m kind of torn on the ending (my version had the ending where the girlfriend throws the boyfriend at the camera, then sniffs him, then attacks the camera). The more I think about it, the more I suppose it was effective, although it was fairly anticlimactic. All in all I enjoyed this movie, even if the trailers DRASTICALLY overhyped it, and the majority of everyone I talked to hated it.

I dunno, 7.5/10? Sure, that sounds about right.

For a review of the sequel, click here.