"'Oh, really? I'm in movies too! Have you ever shown, uh, 'I Married Satan'? How about the sequel, 'I Married Satan 2'?- Elvira, Elvira, Mistress of the Dark"
Paranormal Activity (2009)
Submitted by TheCommune on 10/16/2009
Written and directed by Oren Peli
Starring Demon Off Camera, Katie Featherston and Micah Sloat
Review by Lis Fies
If you haven't seen Paranormal Activity by now, it can't possibly live up to its word of mouth and you're probably a more experienced genre-lover who is over 25. That being said, there's some good content of the Pretty/Scary nature that makes this 11k ultra-low-budget phenom a solid choice for your Halloween bucks.
As you've heard, because you're a smart horror-lover not born under a rock, the movie basically stars a girl, a boy, a camera, and an off-camera demon...
The use of the camera is fairly ingenius, and the nauseating effects of queasy-cam are kept to a minimum by the very effective use of locking the camera down on a creepy tripod shot of the couple's bedroom every night over... what did the day count end up being? A month? Not a detail worth looking up: this isn't Star Trek-level trivia.
What occurs over the course of the month is the only part of the plot that may not have been spoiled for you yet, so by all means allow me to ruin it. Just kidding. Let's talk about why this movie is Pretty/Scary.
The best horror movies tap into a primal fear that the majority of us have as humans, making it universally scary to four quadrants of filmgoers and causing people to stop taking showers or swim in the ocean for decades. Yes, Paranormal Activity is about how ridiculously vulnerable humans are when we blithely sleep a third of our life, and how we don't really have any clue what's going on around us as we're in that vulnerable state. It's bad enough a lion might eat us: so now let's worry about demons!
But you already know that. What you may not know is that the two lead performances in the film are naturalistic and really wonderful. Props to Katie Featherston and Micah Sloat, and writer/director Oren Peli. Together they create a mostly adlibbed modern, healthy relationship that cracks apart at the seams when put under too much literal pressure. Katie And Micah are the embodiment of their gender's fears about relationships. This added bonus makes Paranormal Activity absolutely devastating on a fear scale.
Okay, fun evolutionary psychology "factoids". What is womankind's greatest fear? That man will murder her. What is mankind's greatest fear? That woman will laugh at him. For realsies, people. Not making up what the scientists in a soft science now believe.
Men want to be able to protect and provide for the mate they've chosen. They want to be the strong alpha male and they want to make the right decisions and be their woman's hero. These misunderstood primal needs are often at the core of the dreaded “he won't pull over for directions” fight.
Women want to be safe. They want to know the man they've invested their decision-making power in is going to be able to keep them alive, and not turn on them. They need the man they've entrusted with their safety to make the right decisions for them, and know that if they have to take over making big decisions of safety it means emasculating the man and the end of their relationship. Thus the huge strain on women gritting their teeth in primal fear as their man makes another wrong turn in the minivan.
So how does ths dynamic play out in Paranormal Activity?
Well... as one of my recently single female co-viewers leaned over to me and seethed during our screening: Micah is the Worst Boyfriend Ever.
Oh sure, their relationship looks pretty solid from a modern standpoint. But cavewoman knows better. Primal cavewoman watching each of Micah's horrible choices leading them down a path towards inevitable confrontation with an entity he doesn't respect or believe in knows SOMEONE IS GOING TO DIE.
Watching that gender dynamic play out to its conclusion with two likeable characters we're rooting for? HORRIFYING.
So after you've seen the movie, you either will or won't click with the Hollywood ending Uncle Spielberg "suggested" the indie filmmakers use to get a theatrical release from his studio. If you're like me and think the ending is shockingly out of tone with all the genius that's come before and a huge misstep in an otherwise expertly played hand, check out these two spoilerifc and fantastic founts of info. The first will explain to you in wonderfully technical film terms why the camera use is effective and what its placement does to your subconscious. Zeus bless people who have actually studied the art of filmmaking. Then the Wikipedia article describes the superior original ending Screamfest viewers were treated to in 2007, and the also-would-have-been-much-more-satisyfing-and-devastating alternate ending the studio tested and didn't go with. The history of why it's taken so many years for any studio to get Paranormal Activity into a theatre is also interesting.
http://daveguzman.blogspot.com/2009/08/endings-of-paranormal-activity.html
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What's the rating out of
What's the rating out of five? >.<
Two outta five
I thought that was the moral of the story, guys when your girl says she thinks she's possessed by a demon, you, a) get the hell outta there if you're not ready to take the plunge or b) buy her the biggest fakest diamond crystal quartz ring you can find, call the demonologist and if he's not in, hit the damn yellow pages and don't stop until you find one!
Please tell me there's not a
Please tell me there's not a part where the cad boyfriend says, "Possessed by a demon... honey, are you sure it's just not your time of the month?" That kind of groaner line would work well with a REAL Spielberg ending. Fuckin Jaws jumps out of the bed in an Indiana Jones hat, throws that guy through a plate glass window, bites the chick in half. Then they all have to get on board Schindler's List, The Ride. I'd pay to see that movie. Good review btw.
I liked this movie actually,
I liked this movie actually, it's nice when a movie without an 800 billion budget and eye burning special effects aren't a neccessity. But honestly, the only thing that made me jump (err, scream loudly and clutch my friends arm) wasn't even in the movie.
During the entire movie ushers had been walking into the cinema and just lurking at the back/checking exits. I figured they were just making sure no one was trying to sneak in. At the very end where there's a proglonged period of silence, while everyone is straining to hear..they started banging on the walls of the theater.
Scared the hell out of me. :b