What Works: Even though I saw this movie at the worst possible time period (I’m pretty sure a Bronx high school was sitting behind me and wouldn’t stop laughing, talking, and at one point making bird calls), and the audience almost entirely undercut the suspense, I liked this movie. I actually think this movie is pretty scary, and what works so well is the slow moving dread that lingers in your brain for days as it turns your seemingly banal home into a potential breeding ground for demons you can’t see. The first Paranormal Activity worked so well by actually functioning as an allegory for the mortgage crisis (two yuppies have their dream home and surveillance equipment but will it protect them from forces outside their control?). The second Paranormal Activity was less successful–in my opinion–but this one, miraculously, feels fresh despite clearly having the biggest budget of the PA films (generally, the less money you spend to scare the shit out of me, the better).
Plus, after what felt like twenty years of Saw dominating the Halloween time period, it’s refreshing to go back to a scary movie that doesn’t equate suspense with exposed intestines, hyper cuts in editing, and a convoluted backstory. Well, hold on a second on that convoluted plot at least…
What Doesn’t Work: The Paranormal Activity franchise is starting to go down that same rabbit hole of impossibly convoluted and elaborate mythology that swallowed up the Saw films by the third one (Jigsaw was dead, but somehow planned everything out for four more movies?). This film is technically a prequel to the first movie but so was much of the second one, and now it’s become clear we need to move the story forwards instead of lapping back. Also, the ending borrows a little too heavily from that other great, forgotten gem of fake-documentary style horror: The Last Exorcism.
What I Would Have Done Differently: Changed the time I went to see this movie. Do NOT go when you think high school kids will be in the theater as they WILL try to act tougher and unscared of the movie they’re watching. The very first Paranormal Activity, I watched several weeks into its run during a weekday when I was the only person in the theater, and that was a great atmospheric experience.
Definitely better than the second one and even though it’s a little bit of the same thing around again, it still is totally freaky and has so many chilling moments that will stay in your mind forever. Good review.
I was scared out of my mind while watching this movie but didn’t remember a lot about it afterwards.
This movie is better than the first two but I hated the ending of the movie. I thought that was the most stupid ending to a movie there could be. In ever paranormal activity movie they had a weird ending and the ending just made you want to watch the next movie in the series to see what happened. All of the movies scared me but I think the first one scared me the most because I had never seen any other of the paranormal activity movie and I wasn’t expecting it to be that scary.