Random Movie: Paranormal Activity (2007)

Hollywood is a funny animal. Film studios are willing to drop millions of dollars on movies with horrible movies starring big actors, big gambles that may or may not pay off, and run of the mill sequels that have little redeeming cinematic value but are a sure win at the box office. Yet a movie like Paranormal Activity comes along and flounders for years on the festival circuit (hence the 2007 production year) before finally being picked up and begrudgingly released to theaters throughout the country.

If you follow movies at all, you know the gist of the story. Our couple, Micah and Katie, have been noticing some strange activity in their home. Tech geek Micah decides to get a camera to not only annoy the hell out of Katie in the bathroom but to capture any evidence of the strange occurrences. As the entire film takes place inside the house, mostly with just Micah and Katie, we are confined with them as the incidents occur more frequently and more violently leading to many scenes and images that will undoubtedly be etched into my vapid mind for some time to come.

Now, this film is very polarizing. Even before its wide release, for as many supporters of the film there were as many detractors. As any movie can be viewed in a million different ways by a million different people, my opinion should not shape yours. Movies are special in that each person comes away with their own take with no single opinion exactly the same. But ... this was quite possibly one of the most disturbing movies I have ever seen.
Admittedly, the general concepts of Paranormal are not groundbreaking by any means. On one hand you have a film of "found footage" and the other is a standard haunted house (or person) flick. In fact, this movie could have been made by anyone with a house, a couple of friends with a few days to kill, a decent camera, and a vague sense of special effects. But director (and video game designer) Oren Peli is not a random guy with some free time. One of the best reviews of the film pointed out that the sequences of events seem to ratchet up just like a video game, leading to a boss-fight at the end of the level. It might sound cliched, but for me this film was like a pressure cooker, starting with a slow simmer and ending with a gigantic, punch-in-the-chest finale.

To me, this film almost felt like a remake of The Blair Witch Project, substituting the vast abyss of a wooded forest to the confines of a suburban house. As someone who thoroughly enjoyed Blair Witch (and I'm not ashamed to admit it!), I was intrigued by Paranormal prior to its release and was pleasantly surprised that it exceeded not only the lofty expectations set by other horror and movie fans but my own as well. So, if you watch it and hate it, I won't be surprised based on previous reactions of these types of movies. But, if you watch it and find it (as I did) to be one of the scariest fucking movies you've ever seen, I will be happy. Good filmmaking deserves it and so do horror fans.