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Film Review: Paranormal Activity 3

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In our reality TV, You-Tube world, an eye for an eye (or is that camera for camera?) leaves everyone blind to the unusual.

With so many cameras in our world it’s not surprising we have become desensitised to daily life. Breaking the audience’s ‘contract of the expected’ by introducing supernatural elements to an all to natural setting, with amateur-like camera work, the makers of the Paranormal Activity films have hit the right buttons to make us jump!

Last week we chose Paranormal Activity 3 for our Halloween scary movie kick.

The third in the Paranormal Activity series, it explores the origins of the hauntings experienced by the protagonists in the first two movies – sisters Katie and Kristi – when, as children, they first encounter the invisible entity that will torment their family in all three films.

While it’s easy to separate ourselves when it comes to spacemen and aliens, when something goes bump in the night in a known environment, we are disturbed to our very core. As with the first two films, in Paranormal Activity 3 things that go bump gradually build until they go boom!

The original Paranormal Activity film plays on the fear of the unknown (as successful scary movies do), limiting our range of vision literally, through restricted camera use, and by withholding knowledge regarding the origins of the spirit haunting the young couple.

In the third instalment more information is revealed concerning the spirit’s origins (necessary to avoid a sequel-for-the-sake-of-sequel retelling of the same story). However, by providing more answers, this film leaves less for us to fear.

Consequently Paranormal Activity 3 won’t capture new fans, but those who enjoyed the first two films should take a trip to the cinema, more to absorb new information than experience fresh thrills.

All in all I give this one eight severed heads (out of a possible 13), and a shrill, girlish scream for quality performances by young actors Chloe Csengery (Katie) and Jessica Tyler Brown (Kristi).

On another note, whatever has happened to the cinema? Halloween night. The latest scary box-office flick. And just six people in the theatre! It seems as though going to the movies these days has itself become a ‘paranormal activity’!

Reviewed by: Jon Rawlinson

Genre: Horror
Rated: M, offensive language and content that may disturb
Running time: 121 mins
Gloss Rating: 3 stars