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- monkeychow
- Rep: 661
Re: Paranormal Activity
So this was finally released in Australia last night...and after rave reviews from you guys 
i rushed out to see it.
I'm going to surprise you and say to an extent I've found this film scary but not how you'd expect.
I think perhaps it's a difference in what scares a person.
The actual film itself is not scary. There's no jumps. I can't imagine any need to scream, let alone turn the movie off, wet yourself or any of the orther stories on the net.
But i felt this movie was psychologically scary. After the fact.
In a normal horror, there might be a jump moment or somethign that scares you, but after the movie u don't think about it or the plot of the film at all. This movie was the opposite...i was borderline bored during the first half of the film, and just casually interested during the second...but elements of the idea stuck with me once I left the theatre and I have to admit in a way it kind of spooked me...as a concept....
The lack of scares actually made it more brainfucking to me than the average Boogyman type thrillelr with a bunch of jumps and effects. It's more the idea that's scary.
Of course it could also be be
cause one part of the film reminded me of something. Film end Spolier:
Edit: Which of the endings did you guys see? I'm told there's different ones.
- monkeychow
- Rep: 661
Re: Paranormal Activity
I watched the screener with the "police ending" which I thought was fuckin horrible.
Ahh, mine was the theatrical ending where:
Re: Paranormal Activity
I really hate to admit this... But I just watched it... and I liked it.
The first 25-30 minutes were awful. Just brutal. I almost turned it off several times but decided to rough it out to see if it got better... Okay, I didn't rough it, I fast forwarded to the first bedroom scene... And a little after that.
But I liked the second half. It was creepy with some pretty affective suspense. I thought it was much scarier (I wouldn't call it scary, but I can't think of a better word, but they are horror films, so that's what I'm basing it on) than the Blair Witch Project, but the latter had a much, much better cast. The pacing was also much better. The build up was prerfect. They got you right into the story, whereas PA just fucking dragged, repeated itself, had horrible acting and chemistry, and the improvising was lousy. Character development was excrutiatingly bad. I didn't care for either of the characters, unlike Blair Witch, where I cared about all three characters right off the bat and there wasn't a need for a bunch of mundaine "we're real people with average/normal lives" type scenes because you bought their authenticity right away. PA was just boring and flat.
But I loved the subtlety of the bedroom scenes. The build up and execution were very well done. Her being dragged out of bed and the psychic guy leaving the house right when he walked in were highlights. I fast forwarded through the scenes that explained that this "paranormal activity" was something she encoutered all her life, but I ended up not missing much as I put that together as the story progressed. The burning ouji board was stupid, but I enjoyed the end. The pay off was much more satisfying than Blair Witch.
Go ahead, flame away. It was a dumb movie, but in the end, still enjoyable.
2/4 stars.
Re: Paranormal Activity
I've actually considered watching it again now that the craze is over with. However, I thought it was a steaming pile of shit and I don't really see the passage of time changing my opinion.
I do find it interesting you had to fast forward through the film several times to find it enjoyable. Such actions usually don't define a good film....
