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En un perpetuo estado de déjà vu me mantuvo Paranormal Activity, esa sensación de ‘ya he visto esto’ en otra parte, fue imposible de sacudir mientras vi todo el metraje, y es que para un público más joven la ópera prima de Oren Peli pueda parecer como una novedad, pero para quienes sobrevivimos a The Blair Witch Project (Sanchez & Myrick, 1999) es sencillamente otra película más.

Y aunque las dos películas está separadas por casi una década no es mucho lo que aporta Paranormal Activity dentro del subgénero del ‘found footage’ (grabacion encontrada). Quizás por lo limitado que propone este género podríamos suponer que todas las películas deben parecerse, pero otros ejemplos confirman que aun dentro de sus limitados elementos de forma y fondo el found footage puede dar para más. Véanse los ejemplos de [REC] (Balagueró & Plaza, 2007), Cloverfield (Reeves, 2008)

Lamentablemente en este sentido Paranormal se queda en los planos, en la copia remozada para este nueva generación.

Para el público cautivo puede parecer como una novedad pero para otros es una comiquita repetida. Sin embargo Paranormal Activity tiene a su favor que en un mercado inundado por remakes, secuelas y otras especies similares que solo aplican la misma formula instantánea para el blockbuster, se percibe como algo novedoso y fresco.

Claro yo estoy hablando de la película original de Oren Peli, no la que se estrenó hace algunos meses en el cine. Y Cual es la diferencia? podrá pensar quien lee. La diferencia es esta: Oren Peli filmó con cámaras de vídeo una historia sobre fenómenos paranormales siguiendo un estilo a lo verité (de ahí hago la referencia a The Blair Witch Project) ignoro la razón por la cual la película estuvo inédita durante dos años, pero dice la leyenda (o sencillamente es parte de la estrategia publicitaria) que dicho filme llegó a manos de Steven Spielberg y este se asustó realmente con lo que vió, tanto que pensó que lo que tenía en sus manos era una película ‘maldita’.

Supuestamente Spielberg planeaba “rehacer” la película, pero luego se lo pensó mejor y decidió estrenarla tal cual estaba, con ‘algunas sugerencias para cambios menores’.

Es aquí donde radica mi mayor problema con la película final, esos supuestos cambios menores no fueron tales. Especialmente en lo que concierne al final.

No entraré en detalles para mantener la trama y el final sin descubrir para aquellas personas que aún no ven la película(s) pero si puedo decir que esas sugerencias convirtieron a lo que pudo haber sido una interesante película de terror de bajo presupuesto (más por su historia que por su propuesta formal en si) en un producto serial más, en donde se deja evidencia curiosamente del dominio todavía latente de aquellos elementos del terror asiático que han sido copiados y masticados por el cine de terror actual hasta la saciedad.

Una recomendación para aquellos con bastante tiempo e interés en ver como la maquinaria industrial absorbe cualquier atisbo de personalidad es poder ver ambas versiones de la película.

Finally rented this flick over the holiday break. My delayed viewing is common of me, especially with overly-hyped films. The back of the DVD states that Roger Ebert called it “one truly scary film,” or something of that sort. I truly admire Oren Peli’s independent, low-budget and non-scripted approach (see interview on Jay Leno: http://www.imdb.com/video/hulu/vi2777810201/), but other than a few creepy moments, the film was average at best. After viewing it, I’m convinced on a few things…1) Katie Featherston is HOT, in a girl-next-door kind of way. 2) 100% POV cinematography is played out and best left to the porn industry. The fact that I watched District 9, which wasn’t shot entirely in this fashion, in the same week didn’t help my perception any. 3) I will always be more scared with what I do not see on-screen. The visual effects were subtle, yet effective, and I was repeatedly left wondering when the next big thing would happen. Lastly 4) I am and will always be a paranormal nut! The pace was slow as snails, but in the end, I was entertained. And that’s what movies are all about.

This film, in two word….. Complete rubbish!
Its not scary…. i must admit that i am the jumpy sort when it comes to horror films, but this had not effect on me, i didnt jump once, didnt feel scared and when stuff did happen in the film it was highly predictable. The worst yet is the ending, well not so much of an ending then a sudden stop in the film. considering the trailer and all the reviews saying that this is ‘the scariest film of the year’, and ‘it terrified american audiences’ (well look how mad they went over the Blair witch project, and that was worse than this), it is a complete sham. Wait till it comes out on DVD if you want to watch it, and if you do, at least wait for it to drop down in price it’s worth no more than £3.

very impressed with this, just finished watching it, a subtle idea of re-imagining a tired and tested formula utilising basic equipment and naturalistic treatment throughout. it is exquisitely realised from beginning to end.The acting is very believable and sucks you in as the couple seem like people everyone knows. i was not aware of the hype surrounding the film & all the marketing “buzz” so did not know what to expect. Am a big fan of the J-horror explosion in the early years of the decade, how eerie natural(or in this case supernatural) sounds can be and i liked how this film made its effect on the viewer, the tension builds and i think the single shot capturing of the bedroom at night crucially works, it really is riveting viewing, you don’t know where to focus your attention-either on the couple in bed or the door..anything can happen, i like how you really don’t see much as such but concentrate more on the reaction of the couple,its amazing to think that anyone could have made this film in their home,its pretty inspiring and impressive, maybe that’s why there are so many bregrudgers,there are some very freaky moments that do make your eyes open wide, and the ending is brilliant no matter what anyone says.lots of people here are comparing this to the blair witch,a movie i haven’t seen but i think its unfair and you should take this film on its own merits. however the movie it most reminded me of was Cache by Haneke and it really trumps that, i have been very disappointed with American movie-making over the last few years but this blew me over,a breath of fresh-air..is there more than one version? i saw the 1hr 37min version,am not sure what version many of the other posters have seen,am sure this will have its detractors and will spawn many parodies but am very glad i saw this and am looking forward to seeing it again

A fantastic example of independent filmmakers hitting the big time with a low budget genre outing. Made on a measly budget of $15,000 (but it looks more like $2000), Paranormal Activity has blazed across the U.S. with its’ clever combination of viral marketing campaigns and a resurrection of the horror mockumentary style that made The Blair Witch Project famous. Grossing over ninety-one million dollars in the U.S. and Canada alone, Paranormal Activity is an inspirational film to watch. Director Oren Peli plays successfully upon the common human fears of things that go bump in the night, sadistically drawing painfully frightening moments of suspense from scenes where seemingly nothing is happening. Indeed, the silences are the scariest moments during Paranormal Activity, as each night the camera is turned on and the audience waits with nail-biting anticipation to see what horror will next befall the unfortunate couple of Micah and Katie. Unfortunately, however, Peli’s attempts to build the tension from the beginning of the film are no where near accurate enough to consistently scare the viewer. While a suitably creepy atmosphere is achieved rather well through the disturbing events that occur mostly while Micah leaves his camera unattended, the most horrifying moments of the film aren’t until the last thirty minutes. Viewers will no doubt cringe at the thought of going to sleep after seeing this film, as Peli hits close to viewers’ fears with scenes such as Katie being dragged, screaming from her bed by the foot and down the hallway.
Highly curious of this film since I first saw the trailer online, I made it my business to experience both the theatrical and original cut. I was not disappointed by the decisions made in the theatrical version. The original, containing unnecessarily grotesque scenes of a previous demon-victim eating her own arm in an exorcism cheapened the plot and made the actors seem as if they were laughing at themselves. The theatrical version subtracted this footage and had a much more frightening ending. In fact, so much better than the original cut that I wondered why they would have even bothered filming the original one at all.
Overall, Paranormal Activity is three quarters inadequate scares with lots of pointless suspense, and one quarter hugely original and genuinely disturbing horror. Audiences will have to wait until the end of the film to truly experience the fear the film promises, however. Nowhere near as good as The Blair Witch Project, but a damn fine attempt nonetheless.

I’ve never seen a horror film in a packed theater where the audience was actually screaming, shouting, gasping and hiding behind their hands. Paranormal Activity was a great thrill to see in that environment. It is the best and most effective horror film in recent memory. A thoroughly involving and genuinely scary experience. It’s easy to become jaded about horror films this day in age where the best we can hope for is the neverending Saw saga and worthless remakes of Friday the 13th. These movies offer nothing, not even 90 minutes of pretty pictures to look at. I have always loved horror films, but the problem with horror films (and I’d say comedy films as well) is that there are so few even moderately good ones. You have to sit through a lot of garbage to find a decent one. I was aware of the buzz around Paranormal Activity so I was anxious to see it but definitely cautious not to set my expectations too high. Paranormal Activity did what it set out to do. It works. It is a great and ingenious film. My theory as to why it is such an effective film is that, like other great horror films such as The Exorcist, it takes its subject absolutely seriously. I have no idea if the makers of these films believe in ghosts, demons and poltergeists but they do an awfully good job of establishing from the start that, at least within the context of the film, these things do exist. And by doing so the audience has no choice but to believe it. A lesser movie would have had the obligatory overly dense non-believer who goes through the movie telling everyone he doesn’t believe anything, even in the face of the most blatantly obvious evidence. The dialectical approach rarely works with horror films (example: the atrocious The Exorcism of Emily Rose). For a horror film to work requires belief from the viewer that what their watching either has, is or could happen. To present a horror film as some kind of dramatized logical debate (maybe it did, maybe it didn’t) undermines the horror and is therefore self-defeating. That’s my theory at least. The best horror films don’t give the audience a logical escape route. They leave no questions with regard to the horror or supernatural events depicted. That is what makes them scary. Examples: Rosemary’s Baby – a modern woman can give birth to Satan’s child, The Exorcist – demons exist and can possess people, Poltergeist – ghosts and parallel spiritual dimesions exist in the modern world. These ideas are depicted as indisputable fact in the films. It doesn’t matter what a viewer believes in real life. But they should believe it for at least the running time of the movie if the movie is successful. You don’t have to be Catholic to be effected by The Exorcist and you don’t have to be a new age spiritualist to get into Poltergeist (or Paranormal Activity). These are the qualities that are missing from 99.9% of horror films.
Paranormal Activity works in the way that the best horror films work. It is a frighteningly intense viewing experience. And a whole lot of fun to sit through. I think its one of the best films of the year!

While not exactly scary or terrifying, Paranormal Activity creates a disturbing air of foreboding throughout the film. This is a horror film that uses suspense rather than gore. The quiet moments are the most terrifying. The reason the film works, however, is the naturalistic acting in the film. The two leads are playful yet realistic. There are times where the documentary-style is extremely effective, but the awareness of the camera does burden the narrative on some occasions.

Here we are, a decade later, (well, actually eight years if you factor the 2007 original release date), and the fervor caused by The Blair Witch Project in 1999 has begun again, this time in the world of ghosts/demons. Oren Peli’s low budget thriller Paranormal Activity didn’t enrapture viewers at Slamdance enough to find a distribution deal, but after a viewing by Steven Spielberg, it has become one of the feel-good stories of Hollywood. Loving the simplicity, as I’m sure the potential profit margin too, ($11,000 budget turning into a current $60 million large), the prolific auteur requested a change to the ending to make it more palatable to audiences, trimmed off ten minutes, and gave it its shot at greatness. After an ingenious release tactic through college cities and the internet “demand it for your town” system, Peli’s little engine that could has become a phenomenon in wide release. But with all the hype, and all the audience testimonials, does it live up? Unfortunately for this viewer, the answer is no, not at all.

Back in ’99, I remember still being a little unsure about this Blair Witch thing. Was it real? Was it fake? The excitement was still in its infancy when my sister, cousin, and I went to a night screening at the Amherst Dipson, when we still thought it was kind of a creepy, dingy theatre house. So, the mood was set, the unexpected assumed, and genuine scares delivered. Whatever one may say about its replay value—heck, I don’t think I’ve ever seen it a second time—it was everything it promised to be and more that initial sit down. The final image is still one vividly recalled to mind if thought about. I desperately wanted a repeat of this; the time had come for a ghost story to be chilling in its minimalism and realism. Thinking back, though, there was a lot going against Paranormal Activity successfully achieving it. You know going in that it’s a dramatization; you’ve heard the stories, you’ve seen multiple first-person films come out in the past ten years, but you still hold on to the hope of being terrified. For some reason, however, the so-called build-up of tension just fell flat into uninteresting boredom. Until the final ten/fifteen minutes, half of which was Spielberg’s doing, (and a far cry better than the original ending, watched after I came home from the theatre), I will admit to being restless, waiting for something good to finally occur.

The big problem, I feel, is that so much of the creep factor is shown without a human presence. Unlike a film coming out soon, The Fourth Kind, or Blair Witch itself, this film has its shadow play, its baby powder footprints, and Ouija Board antics occurring without anyone there to react to it. What those other two films had in spades was an experience involving people we as an audience could relate to. We were given the tears, screams, and looks of fear and helplessness, allowing our empathy as human beings to kick in and start feeling those emotions ourselves. Everything that happens in Paranormal Activity does so for us to see, eliciting a smile or a “how did they film that” reaction from myself, and only reacted to by the characters of Katie and Micah the following day from watching video. There is something palpable and resonating about seeing true terror onscreen and relating to it, putting yourself into the situation and fearing what might happen next. Just watching a series of parlor tricks or loud noises off-screen leaves you wanting so much more.

Rather than terror, the reaction we see most is that of excitement and laughter. The demon causing all the fuss has been following Katie around for her entire life and therefore has much more meaning to her. Micah, on-the-other-hand, is just loving the idea that he can catch these phenomena on camera, maybe sell it to a youtube site or something. The guy is a day trader, seemingly to have an infinite amount of spare time as his wealth is increased while he plays amateur documentarian. He is enjoying the experience, trying to provoke the entity living with them for something cool to capture. There are no real stakes for him as he thinks it’s all just a joke—neat things happening, but nothing that will actually hurt his girlfriend of himself. Going against the suggestions of a psychic who came to visit, he doesn’t want a demonologist to help, he instead wants to communicate with the demon himself, in all respects inviting it to come into their world and enjoy complete control over them. So, in a genre of cinema where the impact is greatly influenced by empathizing with the people onscreen, instead of fear we start to feel Micah’s sarcasm and invincibility, effectively taking us out of the terror to wonder when a good scare will finally come.

I do believe both Katie Featherston and Micah Sloat do an admirable job of being realistic without falling into the amateur actor trap. They are playing themselves, leaving all sense of artifice out. The thought of them being “bad actors” never crossed my mind; I felt that they portrayed what they would feel and do if that situation presented itself to them. I do think that they revved up the emotion at the end, however, losing that happy-go-lucky sheen by adding an edge to their performances as stress sets in and things get personal. When the being in the house finally takes a physical interest in the characters, when it finally makes contact with their bodies and proves itself to be there despite being unseen, this film becomes something so much more intriguing. Why did they wait so long before adding those stakes and giving us something to fear? Maybe it’s just me, but lights turning on and off or doors slamming don’t elicit feelings of dread. Two parallel planes of existence overlapping and seeing people moved by an invisible force … now that is something my adrenaline kicks in for. It is just too bad that an intense ten minutes of supernatural simplicity can’t even begin to make up for the hour of laughable seen it all before scare tactics leading up to it.

http://jaredmobarakreviews.wordpress.com/2009/10/31/paranormal-activity/

Unfortunately, Paranormal Activity failed to scare me. It failed to disturb me after the fact and didn’t really do much in the way of originality. However, I was very impressed by the direction. Peli creates a chilling atmosphere that you can feel in the theater. The dread that slowly builds throughout the film does a great job of keeping you enthralled as a viewer. He does a phenomenal job of creating scares with little more than sound, directing your attention to exactly where he wants it throughout the film. For example, in one scene you hear footsteps on the stairs, so your attention is directed towards the door. He holds it there just long enough and then slams the door shut, making the audience jump. The simple use of sound in the film creates most of the scares and I applaud the filmmakers for that. Katie and Micah are also thoroughly believable as, well, Katie and Micah. They reminded me very much so of my girlfriend and me, but even with my making that connection to the film it still failed to frighten me. Overall, I am impressed by the level of filmmaking here, but the hype around this movie is too overwhelming for the film to ever be able to live up to it.

Well, this film had quite a propaganda wich he couldnt stand up to. I wont lie and play a machoman and say that some parts of the film didnt scare me. But it had to many ups and downs (it was too dynamic) to stay scared and to really get into the film. And what in all the way ruined my opinion of a well done scary movie was its ending (with cop killing girl scene).
If i shorten my lines, it’s a totaly watchable film, but dont expect what the media was telling, because the film cant stand up to it’s glorification.

Paranormal Activity gets my respect. Almost every horror film I’ve ever seen has left me with little more than chuckles. I suppose, like most audience members nowadays, I’ve become desensitized to the usual standards of horror. But this movie gave me moments of legitimate chills. Like most great horror, it takes what is a part of our daily existence (in this case, the bedroom) and alters the ways in which we perceive it. What really surprised me though was the amount of humor. In fact, most of its running time is devoted to it. And it’s funny because their conversations and reactions seem to ring so true (that is, given the extreme situation). If you plan on watching this, you really should try and catch it in a theater with a packed audience. I thought the experience in and of itself was half of what did it. The other half in its execution.

I went into this movie with such high hopes and now I feel like a part of my soul was crushed.

Paranormal Activity is just quite simply:

A fucking stupid movie.

I felt some tension for the first half hour until I realized that nothing had happened already because nothing WAS going to happen! Even those momentary scares of a door slamming or a picture falling are taken from you because the shots focus on the object so long you just expect it.

Another note, if you still have yet to watch the trailer and are going to see the movie: DON’T WATCH THE TRAILER. It entirely ruins the movie for you and gives away every single vaguely creepy moment (of which there’s like….one)

In the end, I don’t think a movie this year has been more disappointing than this.

Please. PLEASE skip this shit.

I consider myself to be a self-proclaimed horror aficionado. The last time a movie really scared me was ten years ago with The Blair Witch Project. Ten years later Paranormal Activity came out and had the same effect.

A couple live together in a house that is being progressively tormented by a specter of sorts. Micah, the boyfriend, records the incidents that usually occur in the middle of night for evidence, and from there they try their best to rid themselves of this otherworldly phantom.

Paranormal Activity plays off of its shaky cam for realism, which helps to mold the atmosphere for this minimalistic horror gem. When the lights go out and the camera fast forwards to 2:30 in the morning and the low audible music kicks in, you know that shit is going to go down. That one bit is something I really admire about the film: the sound design. This film is the best example of a horror film with brilliant sound design to come out in ages. Foremost, it serves as a warning to the viewer. Whenever we here this sound that is repeated throughout the entire film we know that something is going to happen. Some people may find this to be a bit lame, as it serves as a red flag for those who think they should cover their eyes in the audience, but it is much more than that. After an hour into the film whenever that sound came up I started to feel literally uncomfortable, I could feel the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. I can only think of a few horror films that actually had me really scared, but this is one of them.

This movie uses a standard setting that is familiar to most people: two lovers living together in a house. The are being spooked by little things that most houses are plagued with: a door moves, stairs creak, things fall off of shelves. When little things like this happen most people tend to stop and listen. They know that nothing is there, but they just have to make sure. Director Oran Peli plays off of this fear to the fullest degree, making us all soil our undies with the slightest creak of a staircase.

This is a movie though that you HAVE to see in the theaters. If you download this or see it on DVD then it will not have the same effect: I can’t stress this enough. I’m sure that I’ll end up seeing this again with my friends, all huddled around a television screen, waiting to get our pants scared off. And once the one hour and thirty-nine minutes run time is up they will make fun of me for being so scared in the theater, and I would have to agree with them. You really do need a giant, dark room full of jittery people and surround sound for the full effect.

I lucked out. I got a free ticket to a secret screening that the Coolidge theater wasn’t even advertising on their own website. The place was crowded. People screamed. This is the first movie in years to literally have me on edge; it was probably one of the best horror movie experiences I have ever had.

One of the most lazy, inept horror films to come out of a decade full of lazy, inept horror films. No atmosphere, no characters, no mythology, just a 100 minute long YouTube video/episode of Ghost Hunters. The movie is built around three or four overnight videos in which scares the equivalent of cheap air-horn and strobe light in the dark carnival ride are dispensed. Everything else is bloated filler in which the endlessly bickering couple continue to act and re-act in a manner which is seemingly always at odds with the “reality” angle of this movie. It’s Jon & Kate plus haint! The 2007 production date and the gimmicky marketing of this film should be clear indication that this is probably not something worth while, but people seem to be falling for it. I’ve heard many people claim they had trouble sleeping after seeing this movie. I found it so boring, I had no trouble at all feeling sleepy the entire time I watched it. The Blair Witch phenomenon was a decade ago. Please stop making movies in this style. “It’s supposed to seem real” is not an excuse for shoddy storytelling, zero craft, or crass and obvious plagiarism. Thanks…

What a Brilliant and Extremely-Scary Horror Films!!! Though I assume watching this movie on DVD, instead of a the big screen, will definitely have a lot less impact… Given that I saw that movie in a Midnight Matinee in a very big screen; it scared the hell out of me…I am a HUGE Horror film fan and most of the time I am very disappointed at the movies that I saw in the big screen, especially the Hollywood ones. This movie is a solid proof that you can make an excellent Horror film with not CGI effects or famous cast. I still get the chills thinking about the ending!