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Paranormal Activity
Directed by Oren Peli
Four stars

Like all good horror movies, Paranormal Activity taps deeply into what makes us scared. I’m not talking about heads on pikes, explicit violence or gore. Those things tend to disgust rather than terrify. Like Rosemary’s Baby, Paranormal Activity contains almost no blood and guts (and what little gruesomeness there is leaves more of an imprint on your psyche than on your stomach), and most of its terror is implied. While the film is about supernatural forces and demons, chances are it will scare you regardless of whether or not you believe in spirits. The reason Paranormal Activity is so effective is because it expresses the very real human fear of being unable to escape from something horrifying. In its own pared-down way, Paranormal Activity is just as brilliant and scary as any horror movie of the last twenty years. Yes, including The Blair Witch Project, its forefather which it has often been compared to.

The film’s scenario is simple -- a couple who have recently moved in together, Katie and Micah (Katie Featherstone and Micah Sloat), have been experiencing weird things in their San Diego home. Doors opening and closing by themselves, footsteps from downstairs, the occasional thud. Katie is convinced that it’s a ghost that has haunted her throughout her life. Micah is not convinced that the disturbances have been caused by anything paranormal (the film intimates that he thinks it’s an intruder of some sort), but he buys an expensive, HD camera to capture whatever strange things happen on film. The conceit of the movie is that all of the footage is filmed by Micah’s camera, and was found after the events depicted in the film.

Katie and Micah invite a ghost expert into their home to see what he makes of the situation. In any other context, this character would seem like a deluded and superstitious charlatan, but the situation that the film creates make him seem wise and plausible. Once again, as in Polanski’s Rosemary’s Baby, we know intellectually that the suggestion of something paranormal happening is silly, but the evidence keeps mounting in its favour. The crazy idea is the only one that makes sense.

The ghost expert, after listening to Katie’s story, tells the couple that rather than dealing with a ghost, they’re being haunted by a demon, a malevolent being who exists purely to create terror in the humans it targets. It wants something from Katie specifically, the expert says, and that’s why the demon has followed her all her life. Micah, in alpha male fashion, tries to isolate the problem and find a solution for it. “Why don’t we find out what it wants and give it to it?” He asks. The expert looks at him, and says almost with derision: “Because it probably wants Katie.”

The movie gets really interesting once Micah sets the camera up in the master bedroom, to record what happens when he and Katie are asleep. As the film progresses, it becomes clear that the introduction of the camera was a big mistake for Micah and Katie. The demon seems to perceive the introduction of the camera as an invitation to put on a show. One of the best sequences in the film is seeing what it does with an Ouija board (a horror movie cliché, subverted brilliantly in this film) that Micah erroneously decides to use to communicate with it. If that scene doesn’t convince you that this thing’s raison d’être is to freak Katie and Micah out, I don’t know what will.

That’s another thing about Paranormal Activity -- this demon, this intangible villain, is given so much personality. We can feel its presence as a being, rather than as an abstract thing introduced into the film only to create conflict. This demon knows perfectly how to push Micah and Katie’s buttons, and how to make them feel deep anxiety. When we see it flicking lights on and off, hear it thumping around downstairs, we may wonder ‘why is it doing that?’ The answer is: for the camera. Everything that the demon does is for the camera. One fun aspect of the movie (and despite the scares, Paranormal Activity is a very fun movie) is that we see what the demon is doing before Micah and Katie do. On the mornings after, we see how Micah and Katie react to the footage that we’ve already seen.

The performances are perfect for this material. This story doesn’t call for ‘big’ acting moments that we expect from movies like this. These are two young people, one a cocky stock-broker, the other a student aspiring to be a teacher. There were discussions, prior to the film being released, of remaking it with a larger budget and different actors (those discussions were quashed after Steven Spielberg saw the original and just how brilliant it is). Not necessary -- both of these actors find exactly the right note for their characters. Micah Sloat, as the cocky and kind of jerky boyfriend basically invites the demon into their lives by constantly antagonising it. There are moments where we just want to throttle him, but that’s because we can see what the demon is capable of before Micah or Katie can. Much of the apprehension we feel in the film stems from the fact that we could shout warnings to the couple, but are powerless to help them.

Paranormal Activity was made for around $10,000, uses only two principal actors and two secondary actors, is set in one house (first-time director Oren Peli’s own house) and is relatively light on special effects, although one or two of the effects are astounding.

There are one or two minor flaws with the movie, but I was, and most people probably will be, too engrossed in the terror to notice them until after it’s over. For instance, Micah and Katie are given the details of a demonologist that is an expert in cases like theirs. When the situation becomes dire, they attempt to contact him only to discover that he’s overseas for a few days. Seems to me that these guys would be desperate and scared enough to try and find another demonologist, of which I imagine there would be several in an area like San Diego. Even if there aren’t, these guys are desperate enough to do more than call after just one demonologist.

The film’s conceit may also be a little egregious, particularly as the demon’s behaviour escalates. I bought the idea that Micah would film everything up to a point, but once real fear and desperation sets in, I can’t imagine he would ensure that the camera was set up to record certain events, particularly the final scenes.

Those minor issues aside, Paranormal Activity is nearly a perfect terror delivery system. Why bother going to see a movie that will unsettle and terrify you? For me, there’s an adrenalin rush in seeing any movie that succeeds so supremely in achieving its goals. Paranormal Activity’s aim is to frighten its audience senseless. Just watch the movie’s trailer, featuring reaction shots of normal people at a test screening to see how it succeeds.

And what a triumph of film-making this movie is! This is a movie that understands that terror doesn’t need to be explicit, loud, over-stylised or overtly gory. Much of the experience of watching Paranormal Activity is waiting for something to happen. But it’s the waiting that will get to you.

By Jonathan Fisher (www.thefilmbrief.com)
October 31st, 2009