'Paranormal Activity' review

Katie Featherston and Micah Sloat (Credit: Paramount)

10 scary movie haunted houses

They’re a steal! And a scream.

Compiled from the recovered home movies of San Diego couple Katie (Katie Featherston) and Micah (Micah Sloat). They recorded their experiences with a ghostly demon who terrorized them in their sleep. Katie had been plagued by the demon for pretty much her whole life, but Micah thought he could put an end to it. First, by setting a camera to film what happened when they snoozed and then by taunting the demon to show itself. Sound like a bad idea? Yeah, it was.

The buzz: One of those amazing Cinderella stories of indie film. "Paranormal" was made for $15,000 and premiered at the 2007 Los Angeles Screamfest Horror Film Festival. It was then rejected by Sundance, but accepted by the smaller scale Slamdance—where it caused a minor stir in 2008. Yet the movie languished without a distributor until executives at DreamWorks convinced Steven Spielberg to watch it on DVD. An instant fan, Spielberg suggested the filmmakers remake the story with a bigger budget. Subsequent test screenings convinced Paramount to release the original movie with just a few tweaks (including a new ending). Viral marketing helped take "Paranormal" from a late-September midnight-showings-only trial run in college towns to last weekend's almost $8 million box office gross, a record breaking performance for a limited release movie. Now the little-horror-movie-that-could opens wide Oct. 16, with massive hype and lofty expectations.

The verdict: Comparisons to "The Blair Witch Project" are inevitable—from the viral marketing, to the mockumentary style (complete with improvised performances by slightly amateurish actors), to the head spinning box office success. Consider that a built-in recommendation test. Loved "Blair Witch"? You'll want to see this. Hated "Blair Witch"? It's probably wise to steer clear.

Of course, it's important to note that more actually happens in "Paranormal Activity," and you will see supernatural action. (Sadly, you see a little too much of it in the film's seemingly coy, but actually spoilery trailer.) The performances also top "Blair's" admittedly low bar, though not by much. Featherston and Sloat's natural chemistry gives them credibility as a couple. But while they're solid at playing relaxed, they're less impressive at playing scared. That's a pretty major problem in a horror film.

Fortunately, writer-director Oren Peli excels at building suspense. Every time the film returns to the couple's bedroom—where they sleep instead of whine or argue—it's instantly soaked in dread. There's palpable tension between the audience's uncertainty of how far the movie will go and the slow build of the demon's intrusions into Katie and Micah's lives, complete with creepy sound design to hit you from all sides. If you buy what the film is selling, you'll certainly leave shaken—and good luck going to sleep that night.

So, mission accomplished, right? Yes and no. "Paranormal Activity" is worth seeing once (preferably with a large audience, preferably after dark), but then what? The success of the film's suspense makes it the ultimate in disposable entertainment. Boil it down and you're left with a great gimmick, not a great horror film. Repeat viewings would seem pointless, if not downright painful. Even the first time through, the increasingly erratic performances and escalating tedium in the downtime between scare scenes only underline what's missing in horror movies aiming for docu-style "realism."

With "Saw VI" right around the corner it's easy to understand the desire for a back-to-basics approach to horror. But why put so many limits on a genre where anything should be possible?

Add a comment