Paranormal Activity

Following in the viral marketing footsteps of The Blair Witch Project, this faux-documentary was made in one week with an $11,000 budget by Oren Peli, an Israeli-born videogame designer. After playing the film-festival circuit, it eventually made its way to the home of Steven Spielberg, who, as the story goes, watched the DVD, then freaked out when his bathroom door was inexplicably locked from the inside! The creepy premise is simple: college student Katie (Katie Featherston) has been haunted by some ghostly demon since a tragic childhood incident, so her day-trader boyfriend, Micah (Micah Sloat), sets up time-coded night-vision surveillance equipment and a camcorder in the bedroom of their suburban tract house to chronicle the otherworldly happenings. What Katie and Micah do during the day is dull—but when the sun sets, weird things occur: doors open by themselves, shadows climb the walls, hallway lights flicker on and off, and ominous scuttling noises are heard. Paranormal Activity offers no CGI monsters, no grisly gore—only a persistent and effective sense of dread. Recommended. [Note: DVD extras include an alternate ending (5 min.), and trailers. Bottom line: a small extras package for a winning horror hit.] (S. Granger)