The "found footage" sub genre of horror films had basically been dormant for years after the smashing success of The Blair Witch Project and the not smashing success of its sequel. It seemed that the "experiment" in horror was possibly just a flash in the pan. Then came this movie and holy crap the explosion of "found footage" films had begun.
Like the two Blair Witch movies, it seemed that the filmmakers intentionally or unintentionally replicated at least the aspect of having the cast share the same first name with their respective characters. Unlike the Blair Witch movies, these people were going to be "average ordinary" citizens who may or may not be living in a haunted house in California suburbia.
In this film we have Katie (played by Katie Featherston) who is living with her obnoxious douche bag boyfriend named Micah (played by Micah Sloat) in Carlsbad California. Katie is a full time student. Micah is a day trader. Sounds pretty typical and normal, don't you think? (That was me being sarcastic.)
Anyway so strange things are happening so Micah's first reaction is to get an expensive camera to film the events that are happening. At first things are pretty boring. There's some sounds that are heard but nothing too major. Then things get more intense. A door swings, a girlfriend stands and stares creepily at her sleeping boyfriend, a shadow shows up on the wall, a chandelier swings (incidentally this seems to be the demon's calling card as it seems that in all but the last two subsequent Paranormal Activity movies there is a chandelier swinging or at least falling. Demons don't like chandeliers or they like to swing on them and then they fall and then they get mad and all hell breaks loose. Perhaps they should put "No demons on or near chandeliers" warnings on chandeliers. But I digress.) Pictures get broken but only Micah's (gee I wonder why after watching the antics of this "charming" guy).
The couple meets with a medium who tells them that they aren't dealing with a haunting but they are dealing with a demon. By the way, the medium comes to this conclusion after talking with them once and having done no research at all. This medium is apparently a legitimate medium who knows everything about everything and doesn't need no stinking research. (More sarcasm by the way folks ;-))
As the movie progresses things get worse particularly for Katie. Micah just seems to be ok with the fact that everything he does makes things worse and his poor girlfriend suffers as a result. I mean she doesn't seem like that bad of a girlfriend. And even if she was, if he wanted to get rid of her there are nicer ways that he could have done this like simply break up with her. I mean, using a demon to torture your girlfriend is pretty messed up. But I digress.
I was fortunate to watch a bootlegged copy of this film that featured an alternate ending that I wished had been kept on the official released dvd/blu ray. Since you probably won't be able to see the alternate ending I will share it with you by describing it since I don't have any way to access the alternate ending that I saw.
In the alternate ending, Katie comes to after she kills Micah. She's horrified and crying. She has blood all over her shirt and the knife still in her hand. She is in shock. As she is trying to process what happened, the cops come into the bedroom. They are responding to a neighbor's call after hearing Micah's scream(s) when Katie is killing him. As a distraught Katie approaches the cops with the knife in her hand and blood on her shirt, the cops call out a warning to put the knife down and put hands up. Katie is still in shock as she walks towards the cops. They shoot and kill her as she is trying to explain. The End.
I thought that that was a pretty brilliant "realistic" ending. Of course the downside of that ending is that it kills part of the franchise. But I would have been ok with that considering that the actual subsequent sequels to this movie specifically were just horrible and stupid although I had very high hopes for The Ghost Dimension (hopefully the last of these movies).
To be fair, this movie has the honor of being the second best "found footage" film simply because it was the second released after the far superior Blair Witch movie. It was ground breaking by itself because it was the first to take place in a suburban setting. It set a base for "bigger and better" things with each "found footage" film trying to top the next one with new tricks to scare the audience while keeping them guessing as to what the tricks will be.
Micah Sloat did an excellent job portraying an absolute shit of a boyfriend. One can hope that this was just a case of very good acting.
In this film at least the footage was reviewed by the characters at intervals. This film also features the camera as strategically placed so that the audience can actually view the events.
There some very good scares I think for the first time watching it. Obviously I liked it enough to own it. It's worth watching at least once if you are curious.
Micah Sloat did an excellent job portraying an absolute shit of a boyfriend. One can hope that this was just a case of very good acting.
In this film at least the footage was reviewed by the characters at intervals. This film also features the camera as strategically placed so that the audience can actually view the events.
There some very good scares I think for the first time watching it. Obviously I liked it enough to own it. It's worth watching at least once if you are curious.
No comments:
Post a Comment