Paranormal Activity (2007)

My wife and I went to see this one on Halloween. I thought it was quite entertaining after the first 20 minutes or so. This film cost only $15,000 to make, and was filmed at director Oren Peli home who also wrote the screenplay. As I’m writing this, the film has grossed around $62 million already. So, it is possible to make an entertaining feature on a dirt cheap shoe string budget if it is creatively done. We were the only ones at the start of the film, and a few more people came in a bit later. There was laughing during some of the scenes. The special effects were quite convincing with the way it was filmed. It left you feeling like this really actually happened and you witnessed something truly supernatural.

The backdrop for this takes place almost entirely inside Peli’s home, aside from several scenes that were filmed on the back porch, pool and driveway. The chemistry between the actors was quite incredible, and very believable. They used one another’s real names; this possibly helped them during the scenes. I suspect a lot of the dialogue was ad-libbed. This film was completed years ago in digital video, and just now is making its way around the country. Paramount Pictures has been unsure how to market this film, but word of mouth certainly seems to be spreading about it. People were talking about it out of the theatre as we left it, and there seemed to be a line forming for a later showing.

The two leading actors in this are Katie Featherston playing Katie and Micah Sloat as Micah. Mark Fredrichs plays The Psychic, Ashley Palmer is Diane, and Amber Armstrong is Amber. Randy McDowell appears in this as well as Tim Piper and Crystal Cartwright as the Exorcism Nanny who was uncredited.

This film certainly set the mood for our evening as later we went to a Haunted Forest event for Halloween. I will recommend this film to others if they enjoy different films away from the mainstream. It certainly stands out apart from the bigger studio productions, and I think that is part of its allure. It would be considered a Horror/Thriller with some comical moments. The tagline that was used was “Don’t See It Alone”