FILM REVIEW: Paranormal Activity 4 (2012)

If you're looking for an original found footage horror film that will seriously blow you away with its unrelenting awesomeness...look elsewhere. If you're in the mood for the same old shit that the creators of the Paranormal Activity  films have been churning out for the last few years...then, this is your film.

I'm not gonna spend too much time with this uninteresting film. I will say that the PA  franchise has never really been a film to go all out with and spend the 12 dollars to watch it in the theater. It is a series best served in the darkness of your living room. These films are meant to be intimate portrayals of horror attacking you at your most vulnerable. The third film was definitely the best of the bunch so far, which is why I would only recommend this latest chapter to the PA  purists out there.

The film picks up in present day. Revealing what happened to Katie and Wyatt. If you're familiar with the series...then, you'll know what I'm talking about. If not...don't worry too much about it...because, in the long run...it really doesn't fucking matter. We are introduced to a new family with a young boy and a teenage girl who loves skyping and recordin....zzzzzZZZZzzzzZZZzzzz

Huh? What?? Oh, damn...sorry...I must've passed out explaining the premise of....(umm...what were we talking about again??)....oh, yeah...Paranormal Activity 4.

So, Katie and Wyatt are back in a new neighborhood and things start to get a little bleak for the new family introduced. While there are tiny threads of interesting concepts that never fully take off, the film mostly exemplifies what this series has become. A tired and uninspiring cash cow raping itself over and over again. And it's too bad because I thought that after the last entry, we would be in store for some interesting fresh concepts and new ways to scare the living hell out of its audience.

Henry Joost and Ariel Schulman (of Catfish  fame) showed us all too brief glimpses of some smart horror filmmaking with the third in the series. Here, they seem to be just making the best with whatever material they've been given. It's almost as if these films are just written as an afterthought in some 5-star bistro during a lunch meeting while Oren Peli is busy thinking up some new crap project to produce in which to finance the next small island he'll be purchasing.

Oren Peli is the true issue here. He broke into the scene with one film. One fucking film which basically re-wrote the way tiny horror films are marketed and he's done nothing since, aside from teasing horror fans everywhere with secret projects that either never go anywhere (Area 51) or end up being insipid examples of what he thinks "horror" can be (Chernobyl Diaries).

Technically, it's a lazy filmmaker's dream. Breaking into the industry with one mammoth hit only to produce mediocre/stupid shit for God knows how long. I sincerely wish that he would spend some of that money with truly amazing projects with great filmmakers. That's why I get so upset whenever I hear about the talented horror filmmakers out there (*cough*Drew Daywalt*cough*) struggling to get a feature off the ground. If you are reading this, Mr. Peli (doubtful...nobody reads my blog LOLz)...please find Mr. Daywalt's number and finance one of his ideas. The man is a horror genius!

Anyzwayz...Paranormal Activity 4  isn't that good. I mean...it's a fine film for what it is...but, it's lazy and pointless. You'll probably enjoy it if you're a super-hardcore fan of the series. However, if you're a genuine horror fan looking for something scary and different...you might wanna just skip this boring waste of time.

Thanks for reading,

bryan.