Grumpy Old Nerds

Stormin' The Theaters: Paranormal Activity 3

Halloween, one of my favorite holidays. It allows women to forget about "Girl Powah" long enough to dress up as slutty as they want to be (that's right ladies, you can quit the facade...I know deep down what you really want to do), it allows the kids to rapidly be on their way to becoming a diabetic by rapidly downing as much candy as one can digest, and it allows a grumpy old nerd like myself to step out in public and pretend I am is just in a very well made costume and have a day to fit in with society which I have to say doing that can sometimes leave a bad taste in my mouth...just now, the very thought of socializing just made me threw up in my mouth a little bit.

There is one other thing about this time frame that can be labeled as either good or bad, depending on how much you like cheese. No, not swiss or cheddar, I'm talking about movie cheese. It's that time of year where the horror movies hit the television and theater by the dozens, and I'm going to talk about one of the movies, Paranormal Activity 3. I am a believer in the paranormal and am a huge fan of the subject. The first movie I enjoyed, but was a bit disappointed that the main trailer had it listed as one of the scariest movies of all time and it didn't give me any kind of scare. Now I'll admit I didn't see the second movie though I did catch what it was about and watched all the supposedly spooky scenes (Thanks Youtube!). I tried to get the movie from Red Box the day before going to see the newest installment but it was sold out, This lead me to question "Do I need to see the second one before seeing the third"? Then I realized, wait this is a prequel, anything from the second movie shouldn't have an effect on the movie.



I'm going to say from the start that seeing this movie was almost ruined for me because of several jackasses that couldn't shut up throughout the entire movie. You know the ones...the person that act's like he's a thug claiming he could fuck you up for telling him to shhh but we all know this prep trying to act like he's a "gangsta" and being all "Yeah yeah yo Mercutio!" and instead is a hundred percent likely to be a bigger pussy than some drugged up skank ass ho that also littered the same theater. It was like I was in the theater seeing WoW trolls in person (see The Old Republic rant for my feelings on Wow Trolls if you don't know what they are). It's a shame, the theater used to be a respectable place, instead it's like someone went into the theater with a ray gun, flipped the setting to devolve and went trigger happy.

I tried to adjust the settings in my brain to block out stupid and it worked for about eighty percent of the flick. I am a believer in the paranormal so damnit, I wanted to be focused on the movie, which I was able to and I have to say this movie was very good. Unlike the other two movies where I watched it and didn't really bother to think about future installments., by the time the end of this movie hit I had the urge to look forward to more, whether starting from where the second movie left off or even another prequel revolving around a discovery made near the end of the movie would be just as cool (and I'm not mentioning that discovery due to possible spoiler). It did a real good job of telling the stories of the sisters from the first and second movie and how it all began. I have to say the director/producer of this movie is a genius, he continued to show that you don't need millions and millions of dollars to make a flashy pile of shit, but with a small budget can produce the desired results of a edge of your seat kind of thriller movie.

For as good as this movie was I can't say that it was without flaws, though. Before I mention them I have to mention one thing that can go either way depending on how you look at it. One thing is that about ninety percent of the stuff that you saw on the trailers is not in the movie, or it's been altered in some way. Most of that is really a good thing, for example the previews you see where Kristi mentions that her invisible friend Tobi is right beside her mother then splashes water like a psycho at her invisible friend to show a figure with the water....that scene was replaced with her just talking with her mother and instead they do the reveal of the ghost earlier with dust from the ceiling that came down from an earthquake falling down on the ghost to see the shoulder of the figure before it wove through more of the dust and vanished. Also there is no paranormal investigator that got his head bashed a few times on the table before being flung away, instead we have a comic relief guy named Randy that is a friend of the main male lead (Dennis) that is watching what Dennis reviewed on his tapes and believed what he seen. Also the Bloody Mary seen where you seen a figure after the girls left, that scene was altered with Katie and Randy doing the Bloody Mary scene, and what happened after that was paranormal activity that didn't involve seeing an apparition. You never get to see Tobi, and to me that's a good thing because it messes with your imagination to have Tobi mentally appear to you as something that can easily creep the hell out of you.

Another flaw I felt with this movie is it went more with sudden scares and less with creepy build-ups. I miss the random noises and the rumbling sound from the first movie. In this one we only get some occasional knocking here and there. I am however willing to forgive that as the last fifteen minutes of the movie clearly made up for the lost creepy factor...that was until they were showing off the grandmother's place and there happened to be a antique pony toy and one of the random douchebags in the theater blurted out "A horse?" to which I replied back with a Raul Julia's M. Bison "Of course!". One other flaw that I can think of is just unnecessary scenes, like for instance near the end they do the fast forwarding of the clock to speed up to get to the paranormal activity, then they slow down time just long enough for Dennis to scratch his chest and then speed the clock back up. I looked carefully, nothing happened in that time frame, nothing was out of ordinary, it was just a itch worthy of slowing time? Also most of the mother (Julie)'s scenes I found to be unnecessary...it just seamed to me like she was there to just be a non-believer until near the very end.

As far as the acting goes I believe this was well acted with only a few small scenes here and there being cheesy, and believe it or not the kids provided no cheese whatsoever. They were both very talented. The girl that played Katie in this flick is quite the trooper. If acting is not in her future then I could easily see her down the road as a stunt woman from all the stunts she had to endure.

Summing things up I feel the movie was ten times better then the first movie. The effects were cooler, there were more intense moments and the ending makes you look forward to future installments. Go see it on the big screen, and bring a crowd of friends with you to wrap yourself up in the atmosphere of other audience members that get scared easily for a maximum enjoyment experience. Just avoid going to a theater filled with nothing but tools and don't be one of those people to ruin the movie experience for others like the trolls in my viewing.

Coolstorm's Rating: Category 4 out of 5