Gasps were no longer heard and jumps in the next seat were no longer felt. The audience had found the normal in paranormal. Paranormal Activity 4 has a predictable and repetitive storyline. Although the movie is thrilling and frightening, the plot is still the same: kid and a teenager getting possessed by an unknown force, which then disappears into the dark of a camera cutting out.
The movie began with a video recording of Wyatt Nelson (Aiden Lovekamp) playing at a soccer game, filmed by his sister Alex Nelson (Kathryn Newton). It didn’t take long to figure out that the next siblings to be harassed by the supernatural force were them. A kid called Robbie (Brady Allen) was caught on tape standing alone, staring at Wyatt on the field. Once again, this character is the obvious child that went missing in Paranormal Activity 3 and it is predictable that his supposed “mother” is actually his possessed sister, Katie (Katie Featherston) who disappeared with him in the previous movie.
The plot was set. The movie has the same characters: a kid, a teenager with an immature boyfriend, a distracted mom and a confused father. One nice interesting touch that writer Zack Estrin and directors Ariel Schulman and Henry Joost added to the new movie was that the house of the supernatural force is just across the street from the targeted family. This relates to how in real life one never knows what kind of people are out there. Then all there was left to see was the random pops of the supernatural force and intentionally-caused “accidents” throughout the movie.
There was a noticeable budget increase in this movie. Unlike the previous movies, Paranormal Activity 4 is more appealing to the teenager age group. Macs were utilized to film footage, the X-Box Kinect was utilized to detect the supernatural force’s presence, the use of the mobile camcorder was reduced and the scenes with white narration were also decreased to less than three to five appearances during the movie.
Even though the movie was very predictable, most of the actors did a superb job portraying the feelings of fear, despair and frustration. The one exception was the mom, Holly Nelson (Alexondra Lee). When she is about to get killed, it seemed as if she is looking at the man behind the camera, signaling him to do his job. She looked pretty calm for someone that was about to get murdered. A good thing is that Paranormal Activity 4, as well as the previous versions, held up the message that communication is essential for a strong family bond.
Paranormal Activity 4 is a nice pick when hanging out on Halloween night with nothing better to do. It is going to get viewers a little frightened, but not surprised. It is better to wait for the movie to be released in the dollar theater or on TV because it is not worth the $10 spent to see it on the big screen. It would be a more intense experience seen while sitting at home, in the pitch dark of the living room. Make sure to have someone to watch it with, just in case.