I enjoyed the first two installments, even though they were identical movies, but the third iteration is too much of the same. I’m out.
This is why the Saw franchise has petered out after seven cloned outings, Final Destination looks kind of shaky after five, and even the original Friday the 13th series managed a mere thirteen films before finally collapsing of ennui.
More of the same can be good. But only to a point.
And we have reached that point with the Paranormal Activity series.
Perhaps the reason we got here so fast is the nature of this particular formula. In a PA movie, the first forty-five minutes – more than half of the eighty minute runtime – consist of a slow procession of random scenes from daily life, alternated with creepy happenings that may or may not have a paranormal source.
The characters are convinced that ghosts aren’t real, of course, which was always one of the strengths of the formula – it puts the audience in superior position! – but at this point, it feels obligatory. What was once a savvy way to ground the movie in verisimilitude now feels like a cheap attempt to fill out a thin story.
And maybe it’s not just the repetition. Maybe the story really is thinner this time out.
Her parents -- this is 1988, mind you -- have the exact same fascination with videotaping every aspect of their existence that Katie's ill-fated boyfriend did in the first movie, and the ill-fated husband of Katie's sister did in the second movie.
But plausibility's not the problem. Repetition's the problem.
Once again, the female character whines and nags about all the videotaping. The male character takes an inordinately long time to realize what he's videotaping is an evil demon, and the kids -- kid singular in the second one, family dog in the first one -- know way more than anyone else does about what's going on.
The only real innovation in "3" is the creation of the oscillating fan cam, which is a video camera attached to the base of a room fan, which enables side to side viewing as the fan base slowly pivots the camera. Much enjoyment is had from the fact that we have to wait a good twenty seconds for the camera to pan from left to right, then back to left, while we squirm in anticipation of what's changed while we were forced to look the other direction.
Thrills like this one are merely tactical, though. Overall, the problem with PA3 is that it explores a backstory that was best left as backstory.
When, in PA1, Katie Featherston, speaking to her sister, alluded to the strange happenings of their childhood without going into detail, we were spooked. But seeing that backstory play out moment by moment, the mystery and intrigue is stripped from it.
The frightening truth is that some things are not meant to be known.
And one of them is the backstory of the Katie Featherston character from PA1.
Chilling, isn’t it?!
SCORE
How Accomplished: 34/100
How Much I Enjoyed: 29/100
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