Paranormal Activity (2007)

 

Hello everyone! By now I'm sure most of you have groaned after reading the title of this week's review but I treated this film like I would any other with honesty and a non-biased perspective. Paranormal Activity was hyped to the gods when I was in 7th grade and I knew from the trailer it wasn't worth watching...so I didn't. It wasn't until I was in my junior or senior year in high school (freshman year college even) that I decided to give it a shot. Frankly, I don't remember watching it nor forming a solid opinion on it. For most viewers, that alone is sufficient. Now, however, I'm in a position where I can watch a horror film for the first time and document it for not only myself but for an audience who care about what they watch.

As a veteran horror film enthusiast, I have a lot to say about Paranormal Activity.

Paranormal Activity was originally released in 2007 as an independent film with screenings at film festivals but after Paramount Pictures took over, its official nationwide release was October 16, 2009. The film was written, produced, edited, photographed, and directed by Oren Peli. I highly encourage you read about the making of the film on your own time. It birthed a few sequels, as well. It stars Katie Featherston and Micah Sloat. The film runs for 88 minutes total.

Paranormal Activity is a found-footage supernatural horror film centered on a young couple in San Diego, CA that decide to purchase a camera to record every moment of their daily lives, day and night, to capture all the haunting occurrences happening in their once peaceful home. 

Pros: Found-footage style is, in my opinion, the best way to capture horror and will never go out of style. Paranormal did a great job creating an incredibly organic perspective as a result without unnecessarily compromising the length of the story. In comparison to Lake Mungo, this film was successful in maintaing a consistent story line and filling in time adequately. It was realistic to a degree and, in my opinion, the more realistic the better. It puts me in an uncomfortable headspace thinking about all that I would do if I was in the characters' shoes. Horror to me is about all of life's terrifying possibilities. Additionally, they nailed the setting and atmosphere. I'd like to think it was cozy but you can take that however you'd like. Unfortunately, there were more cons than there were pros as most of you expected. The story is the most generic supernatural story you could conjure. There was truly nothing impressive about it and it's one you've seen plenty prior to 2007. No personality or flair. Just a straight, Californian white couple going through it. Peli says he gravitated towards the actors because they had chemistry during their auditions but they failed to convey that in the film. Their poor attempt to conceal the lack of characters' depth was done by constant flirting which became old quckly. How the occult was presented was laughable and juvenile. There was no score, by the way. Just the same, repeated sound effects.

Paranormal Activity is a surface level horror film you'd show your 4-year old brother to scare him straight. It's a movie you don't have to pay attention to and is best left in the background while you clean your room. If you like soft horror, would like to gift your younger siblings some nightmares, or if you're okay with wasting your time on a Saturday night, then I do recommend it. 

My general rating is 2.5/10. Based on:

-Found-footage style

-Consistent story

-Comfortable length of film

-No score, oddly

This is my lowest rating film to date. I truly went into the film with an open mind. I'll loosely watch it again while I clean out my closet next time. 

Thanks for reading! Please let me know what you think. As always, feel free to recommend any films so that I can review them here. At the moment, I'm not sure which will be my next review but I'd like to try something new...

Stay safe and make wise decisions!

-CL