Paranormal Activity movie review

Things that go bump in the night,

Should not really give one such a fright,

It's the hole in each ear,

That lets in the fear,

That, and the absence of light!

Spike Milligan

What I particularly liked about Paranormal Activity:

• the screenplay was tight with dialogue used to serve the story (not a time filler between scares as witnessed in Blair Witch Project)
• the story deftly avoided the input of ‘experts’ allowing our housemates to face the dangers on their own
• the dread builds over the course before the pay-off shots of Katie being dragged from her bed and being possessed
• the use of sound-effects to create tension and the main characters’ reaction to it meant that the filmmakers could delay actually showing the “monster”; a key lesson from Jaws
• by being upfront about shooting the film on a “handi-cam” (as the characters are documenting their own experience) allows the filmmakers to create low expectations regarding overall quality and to create a grainy picture quality (esp during night scenes) which add to overall mood

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