• What’s Good: The scene with the baby powder. The amazing anticipation anytime we’re in the bedroom seen above. Usually the ghost just fluffs pillows but it’s still really exciting.
• What’s Not:A very shallow film. The film does not even try that hard to make us think that the characters “should” stay at home, I love how a visiting ghost Dr. gets creeped out by the energy in the house and screams “oh, and the presence will follow you wherever you go… lata!” on his way out.

It took about ten years but the horror genre finally gets its unlikely successor to ”Blair Witch.” Which (haha) basically means that everyone will see this un-seen ghost movie once, and probably even like it (as I did), but, because it’s a gimmicky ”reality” spook show where, as its non-fans love to point out, ”nothing happens,” where do we go from there? Nowhere, this is the end of the line. Others will copy “Paranormal Activity” but none work because what’s there to copy? There is simply not much to hold on to or embrace in terms of actual content or any measure of horror mythology. I guess they could do “Paranormal Activity 2″ set in the attic but anything short of that limits this phenomom’s had-to-be-there potential. Still, any successful horror movie that’s not ”Saw” should be seen and supported.  

Funny how just a few days after the art house horror-esq movie ”Antichrist” arrives another film with similarities such as (a) there are only two characters in the whole movie; (b) the two characters are married; (c) the characters are trapped, by their own design, in a confined space such as a house even though they could leave at any moment; (d) the wife in both relationships is deeply disturbed by inner demons that, in the case of “Paranormal Activity” but not “Antichrist,” are LITERAL demons.

This is what I call a Youtube horror movie where a house is haunted and… and… um, yeah, it’s haunted you see and… uhhhh, a dude captures it all on film with his new camera. His reasons for constantly shooting the house and his girlfriend is unclear because he doesn’t do anything with the footage except watch it and go “woah, look at that!” only to continue to stay in a house that is clearly going to hell. He’s a dumb ass horror movie character in other words. The premise is as a thin as the spectre. All the “scary” stuff happens in the bedroom, but only at night because ghosts love the night. (I have a theory that the new Leno show is so bad that the ghost snapped and decided it would rather entertain itself by scaring this retarded.) At night, the cool sound of wobbling energy (the ghost materializing?) is usually followed by a noise, a tap, a gust of wind or some sort of otherworldly ghostly resonance. If the movie “Jaws” has the tagline ”Don’t go in the water” then ”Paranormal Activity’s” should be “don’t go in the bedroom.” And on that level it really works! I for one scared the shit out of my sister who lives in my upstairs apartment and I urge everyone to do the same (to your sister, not mine please). The hauntings become more severe until the end where I must admit to have seen the different, and more subtle, ending than what was in the theatrical cut. I liked what I saw and hated the one you probably saw, which makes no sense. 

Either way, a similar but vastly superior handheld or Youtube horror film, with a real story and a tangible menace, is the underrated “Quarantine,” a remake of the equally good but most would say better Mexican film “[rec].” That film has rage zombies that tear apart human flesh while this one has… an invisible ghost that closes doors at night. That sounds (and sometimes is) underwhelming but ”Paranormal Activity” accomplishes its very basic mission statement of slowly creeping us out. And its hard to hold a film accountable for a lack of substance when I can’t look away from a it? The film is not really directed and the story is not really told but the sum of the parts adds up to a really effective horror film that had me h(sp)ooked all the way through. As is the case with “Blair Witch,” “Paranormal Activity” the film will be forgotten but the experience of watching it is here to stay.

Paranormal Activity: B / Lasting Appeal: D