Director: Oren Peli
Starring: Katie Featherston, Micah Sloat
My Rating: Didn't like it
Budget: $15 K
Box Office: $193 Million (according to wikipedia)
All aboard the hype train! Well, it came out five years ago and the series has been thoroughly ran right into the ground, so all aboard the quiet car now. But that's exactly what ruined this movie for me: hype. I was geared up for the scariest film of all time. And what I got were a couple bumps in the night and one slightly scary moment at the very end of the movie. The marketing campaign was the real success of Paranormal Activity.
Don't get me wrong, it's impressive for its budget and it clearly was a massive box office smash, but I was so utterly bored and let down throughout the whole movie. Maybe I'm jaded though, because the crowded theater I saw it in had loads of people screaming at every opportunity. When it ended I was thoroughly pissed off that I had spent any money seeing it, and that rarely happens to me. I'm a movie lover. There are some really bad movies that I adore with all my heart, but there was seriously nothing for me to like about Paranormal Activity.
If you want good, creepy, low budget horror, I suggest The Blair Witch Project. Even though the two films are similar in many ways, at least The Blair Witch Project has a few entertaining and visceral moments before the final chilling shot; which is way more than Paranormal Activity can say.