What the hell was all the hype about "Paranormal Activity" for? Who is it that's been saying this is "one of the scariest films of all time?" I don't get it personally. Just know that if you've seen the trailer for this movie, you've seen about 90% of all the good things in it.
Katie (Katie Featherston) and Micah (Micah Sloat) are your average young couple. He trades stock for a living, and she's going to school to be a teacher. Katie's been haunted since she was eight years old, so Micah purchases a camera to see if they can document these strange occurrences while they sleep. You know, sounds like thumping, or knocking, or creaking. As the film progresses over about a month or so of time, the demon gradually ups the ante. Can Katie and Micah survive this otherworldly annoyance?
By the end of the film, I was too bored to care. The movie is stuck in a constant cycle for the entire hour and a half it's playing. Nighttime, the characters sleep, and a couple thumps happen. They freak out. Daytime. They discuss what happened the previous night, and often force us to rewatch the footage we've just seen with their own commentary. The next night, they hear two thumps and a creak, they freak out, and so on. At one point Micah is walking around with the camera, speaking aloud to the apparition: "Hey! You haven't done anything interesting in a while!" I had to chuckle since I was thinking the very same thing about Micah.
This is what you'll be seeing about a third of the time at "Paranormal Activity."
To be fair, when the film succeeded it was genuinely frightening, but those moments constitute maybe two cumulative minutes of screen time. Both actors do the best jobs they can with these characters, and Michael Bayouth as the psychic brings a good professionalism to a person that most of us would expect to be kooky and weird. But they're just strong rowers in a boat that's sinking.
Let's put it this way. This would've made a phenomenal ten minute YouTube movie, but as a feature it simply fails.
Bottom Line: I should've seen "Zombieland" for a third time. Avoid.
Paranormal Activity
One out of Five Stars
Directed by Oren Peli
Starring: Katie Featherston, Micah Sloat, and Michael Bayouth
