Paranormal Activity did more than shock audiences when it arrived on screens in 2009. It changed the way Hollywood thought of doing business. The independently produced and made movie truly put the found footage formula on the Tinsel Town map and also showed that you didn’t have to spend a lot of money to make a lot of money at the box office.
Fast forward to 2015 and we know have our sixth movie in the series hitting screens in time for Halloween, Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension. After trying to do a spin-off with Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones and coming up short, producers of the franchise thought it might be time to answer some questions and put the series to bed.
What gets us sometimes about horror films is the unknown. The mystery is what is so scary and by answering questions, not only do you make the current film not-so-scary, but also have the potential to undermine the terror factor of the ones that came before in the franchise. Paranormal Activity does not have to worry about that. The first film stands alone in its greatness and true horror that nothing can take away. But as the film series grew into a second, third and so-on chapters, it became less and less easy to find ways to simultaneously explain to the audience why there is this Paranormal Activity, but also make it scary to an audience who has literally seen it all.
Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension continues the found footage storytelling methodology of the series by not even explaining why this family in this uber-nice suburban dwelling is taping everything. I guess at this point that is just a given. At least tell us why dad and his video camera are a constant!
Ryan (Chris J. Murray) and his wife Emily (Brit Shaw) seem to be truly happy settling into their palatial home with their little girl Leila (Ivy George). Unboxing all the Christmas décor for the holidays, they uncover one box they don’t recognize. It contains a series of video tapes and a camera that has some special features. Ryan’s newly moved in brother Mike (Dan Gill) and his sibling take great interest in both the tapes and the camera. See, the tapes contains footage pertaining to what the audience knows are the past Paranormal Activity movies and the camera captures spirit images from the beyond that are living in our world.
One thing that does work extremely well in Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension is the fact that it is in 3D. Seeing the “activity” come at you and having the viewer enter its entity as it were, is something both haunting and spectacular.
But, explaining the backstory (that we all know all-too well by this point after five previous films) in a context that fits another horror chapter, does not quite work so well. Making Leila the focal point of this demon is something that is hardly new to those of us who have watched the entire series. This demonic force loves to take children under its wing… give us something new!
Will fans of the series be pleased with this supposed final chapter? The screening The Movie Mensch attended was filled mostly by those fans and they were quite vocal in their enjoyment of being terrorized by what they saw onscreen. But, then again, those shock and awe moments that occur throughout the film are ones we’ve seen before, so more astute horror fans may craze something more.
Overall, this fan of the Paranormal Activity series is rather pleased that it appears The Ghost Dimension will be the last Activity.
Grade: D