Movie review: Paranormal Activity

No sympathy for the day trader.

by John P. Meyer

Bad framing, soft focus, rough cuts, and the ever-popular unsteady-cam effect combine to give Oren Peli's Paranormal Activity that genuine rank amateur feel -- but it's all done in service of the film's premise, which is that the players are ... well ... rank amateurs when it comes to filmmaking.

Those players -- live-in couple Micah (Micah Sloat) and Katie (SMU alumna Katie Featherston) -- are being bothered by things going bump in the night. Their acquisition of the videocam is intended to be a way for them to record their experiences.

(Full disclosure: only Katie is being bothered by the ghostly noises, and only Micah thinks the video camera is a good idea.)

Peli chose to make a movie that looks like a rank amateur production because a) he's a rank amateur, and b) he didn't have any money (the whole thing cost $11,000 to put in the can). And by using his lack of resources as a key narrative element -- cleverly playing it up instead of playing it down -- he's struck entertainment gold.

With comparisons to The Blair Witch Project zooming in from all points on the critical compass, let me quickly confirm that Paranormal easily eclipses Blair Witch in terms of both scariness and script. Paranormal's claustrophobic indoor setting enhances the steadily-mounting tension as the shadowy entity slowly ramps up his (her? its?) unsettling manifestations; events build to a terrifying (if not entirely surprising) climax after an hour and a half.

And - nice touch! - Peli injects something unexpectedly profound into the scare tactics mix: a chilling post-viewing realization that, about halfway through the film, we were presented with a teasing foreshadowing of the outcome.

A shoestring project such as this can only be effective if the lead actors prove up to the challenge, which in this case amounts to making us believe that they are real people caught up in a real situation. Both Featherston and Sloat succeed at this, coming across on camera as a genuine young couple (she an English grad student; he a day trader) engaged in genuine cohabiting interplay. The fact that Katie just wants this ghostly annoyance to go away, while Micah wants to get it all on camera, comprises the basis of the human conflict.

The un-human conflict is another story, which brings us to the topic of what's going on in this suburban San Diego Fox & Jacobs special. I don't want to give too much away, but let's just say that Peli uses sound design to good effect and keeps the visual effects to a minimum. (Which makes those that do show up on camera all the more creep-inducing.)

Only two other actors make notable appearances: Mark Fredrichs as a psychic investigator who -- unfortunately for all concerned -- specializes in ghosts; and Amber Armstrong as Katie's friend Amber, who makes one or two appearances in the house to act as something of a sounding board for the two leads.

The mystery of just what sort of entity it is that's troubling the household is soon laid to rest, though those with a background interest in the paranormal will recognize that its early identification as a demon might be a bit premature: the option of a poltergeist (which would fit with the fact that the manifestations focus on Katie) is never even considered. I guess we can blame it on Buffy culture having been so firmly entrenched in the group consciousness.

Aside from this gripe -- and the fact that for some damn reason Katie continues to sleep on the side of the bed closest to the door (what idiots!) -- from a narrative standpoint, the whole construct holds up pretty well, with the evil spirit gaining strength from the ill-considered attention that Micah insists on feeding it.

Talk about your just desserts.