Paranormal Activity (2007)

Paranormal Activity is the film that brought Oren Peli to the attention of the movie world with arguably his best film. I think like most people this one got discovered at home instead of the cinema. The film follows a couple who are being haunted by something or someone and its revealed fairly early on the its Katie who has had to deal with this her whole live (PA3 goes into painstaking detail about it) and as the film progresses things get worse and it’s the staple of every horror/found footage film ever made.

Micah is an absolute scumbag. Sorry but he is. Everything that happens is because he made things worse and when Katie wanted him to stop, he just decided to make things worse and so it's hard to feel anything for him. There is a point in the movie when Katie says that maybe they shouldn’t have the camera and Micah replies that this stuff is golden. He is the biggest moron in history. I know in horror films there should be at least one but I can't think of anyone who does more to annoy spirits and bad stuff than Micah.

There is a point where even the stupidest of people would think that this is the best time to drop the camera stuff and make up with his girlfriend but no, he seems to ramp up his stupid activities. You could also argue that Katie is to blame for putting up with him but I suppose every character in a horror film has to have some flaws. 

The ending of the film is one of the reasons why I like this film. I didn’t know much about this film when I first saw it and I watched it at a friend's house with the lights off and the sight of Micah’s body flying towards the screen was one of the biggest jump scares I have had in a very long time. Even know I still find it a thrilling ending and that shows how good the film works. I know there is a version where Katie sits in the bedroom by the bed and then sometime later police enter the house and kill Katie (which I have seen on YouTube) but I would like to have seen that ending on the DVD because I think that it works as a better ending but I suppose the ending they went with is perhaps the best one for continuing a story.

This is the best of the Paranormal Activity films because after this, you knew what to expect and I think it was in the reviews for this film that I first heard the term ‘cattle prod cinema’ referring to the habit of jump scares which aren’t that difficult to create and only have a moment in your mind before you move on. I think that The Marked Ones is the next best but this Paranormal Activity will always be the one that I stick on first and think that this film is responsible for the tidal wave of found footage films that followed which showed that you can make them cheaply with a flimsy plot but still make some money even if the IMDB rating isn’t the best.