How are the Paranormal Activity movies? I've held off on watching either of them until now, and I'm just wondering what lovers of the genre think of these movies. I've really only heard comments from my friends who don't really watch much horror and they were saying it's the scariest thing ever. Now I'm far past the point of actually expecting to be scared by movies, so I don't really want to get my hopes up.. I'm just wondering, are they good? Did you enjoy them? I can't really think of many horror films in the past few years that have stood out to me as great... but people seem to speak pretty highly of this series.
I haven't seen the first one, and don't really consider myself a horror movie buff at all, but... Paranormal Activity 2 was one of the worst pieces of **** I've ever seen in my life. Horrible plot, horror, acting, and style. Not a redeeming quality about it.
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I'm no horror buff, but I can handle a scary movie better than most and thought PA was pretty haunting. Haven't seen the sequels, but the first is definitely worth checking out.
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From: Pretty_Odd | #008 The first one is ok, but it's not scary. If you're a rowdy _________, you'd be in the theater yelling "AWW HELL NAW!" when you see a door move.
my god
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The first one is ok, but it's not scary. If you're a rowdy _________, you'd be in the theater yelling "AWW HELL NAW!" when you see a door move. That was most of what made it a somewhat entertaining experience. You won't get much of anything out of it watching at home.
I feel like you just suggested I'm a ________. And there is only one word I can think to put there.
StealThisSheen posted... They're pretty bad. The horror just never feels real. It's all too hokey.
This. The immersion just isn't there because they try to play it off as footage ripped from a video camera. You are very aware that you are in fact watching a movie the whole time so it's a lot harder to get scared.
From: StealThisSheen | #017 Pretty_Odd posted... Woman. I meant woman. Damn you guys.
The hell you did. "Aww hell naw?"
I really am serious. I may have exagerated the accent a bit. That's kinda how most people talk around me. All I remember from seeing it in the theater was girls screaming at every little f***ing thing that happened.
You can ascertain WHATEVER stereotype you want out of that. I'm telling you, what went in the blank was women. End of story. I'm not as racist as you people. That's all you ever think about.
From: ExThaNemesis | #023 why do we still respond to guiga
legit question dudes coz I did it too
I don't even know. I mean I know there is no possible way that he is a real person and not a character, yet I still want to ask why he felt the need to block out "woman", when you're allowed to say "rowdy woman" on this site.
From: thundersheep | #030 I don't even know. I mean I know there is no possible way that he is a real person and not a character, yet I still want to ask why he felt the need to block out "woman", when you're allowed to say "rowdy woman" on this site.
Dude, I have literally been _____ for what was allegedly a sexist joke. About driving. Seriously.
From: ExThaNemesis | #031 ^It's because he wanted this reaction to transpire.
The same way he wanted someone to see that post about Paranormal Entity and then flip out because that movie is so bad.
That was a joke. I'm a funny guy. I still think it's worth watching. I mean, for one thing there's a hot girl in it. The movie itself isn't really any worse than Activity. I just think it's funny how they made such a complete ripoff, and I wonder how they actually make money off of it.
I'm not a huge fan of the fauxcumentary movies. Blair Witch was good, and maybe Cloverfield, but pretty much every other one has been garbage. Doesn't stop me from seeing them mind you; I want to see Grave Encounters, but I still don't care for them as much as other horror.
Paranormal Activity is a bit slow, but it isn't too bad for a movie. The ending was kinda lame imo, but the movie is executed well. PA2 is absolute ass.
Hmm. Lots of conflicting opinions. Guess I'll watch them both and see what I think. I also need to watch Blair Witch... should be a good weekend.
The main reason I asked for the opinion of horror movie buffs is because I feel that in this genre, movies don't actually have to be "good" to be enjoyable. The general quality of horror movies is so low that any lover of the genre is no stranger to watching terrible movies, and they can see that even if something isn't exactly "scary" it can still be fun and interesting to watch.
The first one kinda bugged me throughout because I just couldn't buy that the characters were running around lugging that bigass camera with them and filming everything while all that crazy **** was going down. I mean I know that the guy was supposed to be a little obsessed with filming everything but I just didn't buy that he would have been holding that hugeass camera in front of his face during several of the major scenes.
The second one was a little more plausible in that they've got a series of security cameras all over the house recording 24/7 and the bulk of the footage came from those, at least insofar as it's at all plausible that someone would install such a setup in their own home. And despite this, during the big climax, the characters STILL managed to lug a camera around during the big action climax, although I think the idea was supposed to be that they were using the camera's night vision to see in the dark. But despite this the movie was worse, as it bolted on a fairly conventional horror plot to the first movie that wasn't really there originally, and was also populated by cliched stock horror characters (the skeptic who can never be convinced to take stuff seriously, the religious person whose warnings are ignored, the animal that knows when something is wrong that no one else can see, etc etc).
Another thing that bugged me in the second one was one scene where **SLIGHT SPOILERS**
all the kitchen cabinets fly open at once for a jump scare. Remember how I said it was all filmed with fixed security cams? So the cabinets fly open in a shot from a camera that's in the kitchen facing out into the living room. When the character who got scared off by this hesitantly returns to shut the cabinets, the shot is from another camera in the living room facing into the kitchen. What this reveals is that the only cabinets that ACTUALLY flew open were the ones you could see in the first shot; when the character returns to close them, you can see some other cabinets that were out of frame in the first shot, and they remained closed. This just smacks of laziness. They didn't even need to rig those cabinets up to open on their own like the others! They could have opened them manually between shots!
Oh and about Blair Witch, it's definitely better than any other fake-real-footage horror film I've seen, but make sure you pay very close attention during the beginning where they're interviewing townspeople about the Blair Witch legend. There's one interview in particular that basically explains WHY the rest of the movie is supposed to scare you. When I watched it the first time, someone talked over this part and I didn't bother to rewind it, and I just ended up confused as to why anyone was scared by it.
I was hoping to get some green before I watched these movies (tends to let me be more critical), but it doesn't look like that'll happen this week. I guess I'll start with Blair Witch tonight, and then move into Paranormal 1 and 2. Reviews after each.
Paranormal Activity 1 was great. It didn't seem "real" at any point, but I've never felt that that's what horror or slasher films are about. The characters were interesting enough and they acted quite well. I wouldn't call the movie scary at any point, but I was still quite invested in the plot and I was always excited to see what would happen during the night. The boyfriend was a real class A dick, and I thought that was a nice change from what you're used to seeing in the sub-genre. Although I understand there had to be a character there to "anger" the demon, it got pretty ridiculous about halfway through the movie when he was basically trying to chase the demon out or corner him or whatever. I mean the demon proved it was invisible on the first goddamn night what was the dude expecting to do? Punch it to death? He took the tough guy thing a little too far, but it definitely set up a nice reason for why the exorcist wasn't a huge part of the film. My biggest complaint would have to be the last 5 seconds or so of the movie. The chick crawling up to the camera was so ****ing stupid. It honestly would have been a high-tier horror movie for me if it didn't include that last 5 seconds. The part where the demon convinces the boyfriend to just stay one more night was the perfect amount of subtlety to show that it wasn't really her anymore. I mean yeah, it was obviously not her, but that little smile at the end was just great. That's all the movie needed, nothing more after the screams and silence at the end.
Anyways... I'll watch the second movie either today or tonight.
Definitely MWC. He also wishes death on the entire state of North Carolina, solely because he's a bitter Kentucky fan. Seriously, he's making 99% of all Duke AND State fans sound completely normal by comparison.
Anyway, on topic, never enjoyed the Paranormal films myself.
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The first movie is pretty cool. The second movie is pretty bad but enjoyable. Because I like bad horror movies. Haven't seen the third one but planning to, it's always fun to watch these movies with friends.
edit: And Blair Witch is really good because of the whole atmosphere the movie has for me.
Oh! And if you want to watch the best movie in this genre, watch [REC]. The original that is. It's in Spanish, but if you like this format you won't regret it. Legitimately the scariest movie I've seen in my life. And I've seen tons of horrors. Most of them horrible, admittedly.
The first movie is pretty cool. The second movie is pretty bad but enjoyable. Because I like bad horror movies. Haven't seen the third one but planning to, it's always fun to watch these movies with friends.
edit: And Blair Witch is really good because of the whole atmosphere the movie has for me.
From: VincentLauw | #045 Oh! And if you want to watch the best movie in this genre, watch [REC]. The original that is. It's in Spanish, but if you like this format you won't regret it. Legitimately the scariest movie I've seen in my life. And I've seen tons of horrors. Most of them horrible, admittedly.
~*~SPOILERS FOR BLAIR WITCH~*~
Yeah, I liked the setup for the Blair Witch. I can't get enough of "fake real footage" I loved the part where they were talking to the townspeople about the legend. Reminds me of the final part of the newer (2003?) Texas Chainsaw Massacre. That last bit of fake footage really made the movie for me. What I didn't like about Blair Witch was that for all these years I've read and heard people talking about the ending as if it was something special. The ending was just... and ending. It really couldn't have ended any other way based on what you heard earlier in the film and after the other dude gets separated from the group, it becomes kind of obvious. I honestly did like the documentary part of the film, it was just the horror that never got me. And the crying always sounded really fake and it took me out of the experience a couple of times. I feel like if I watched it back when it was big (and I had the chance, since horror was all I watched in those days) that I would have enjoyed it much more. I was a lot less critical back then.
END SPOILERS
But yeah, I see [REC] mentioned all the time in horror discussion. It's on Netflix so I will definitely get to it... Might as well watch it after Paranormal 2 since I'm in the genre. Is the sequel any good?
From: VincentLauw | #045 Oh! And if you want to watch the best movie in this genre, watch [REC]. The original that is. It's in Spanish, but if you like this format you won't regret it. Legitimately the scariest movie I've seen in my life. And I've seen tons of horrors. Most of them horrible, admittedly.
I forgot about [*REC]. That is definitely a top tier fauxcumentary. If you can't stand Subtitles, you could watch Quarantine, but it's not really as good.
Paranormal Activity 2 was alright. Both movies in the series were good until the "action". All the scenes where you see people getting jacked just seemed kinda dumb. It was much more interesting just seeing it do weird things around the house for some reason.
[REC] on the other hand was top tier. I've always found people to be far more scary than the paranormal and I think that movie proved it. I didn't find any part of it scary, but I was legitimately creeped out by the sight of "subject zero". Which reminds me that I forgot to mention when talking about Blair Witch... I found the scariest part of that movie to be the crazy woman they interviewed about the legend.
I had no idea [REC] was a zombie movie though. Now I have the desire to finally start watching The Walking Dead.