Paranormal Actvity 3

Set in 1988, we go back in time to see the events mentioned and explored in the first two Paranormal Activity movies. Kristi (Jessica Tyler Brown) and Katie (Chloe Csengery) are little girls living with their mother, Julie (Lauren Bittner), and her boyfriend, Dennis (Christopher Nicholas Smith). Things start going bump in the night, and the girls have been talking to an imaginary friend, so Dennis, who videotapes weddings for a living, decides to set up some cameras around the house to capture whatever might be trying to reach out to the family from the other side.

What is it?

What does it want?

Directors Henry Joost and Ariel Schulman didn't invent the Paranormal Activity formula, but they sure do spice it up! Unlike Paranormal Activity 2, the audience doesn't have to wait until the last 20 minutes for all of the action to kick in. Paranormal Activity 3 has a much better pace with the scares coming earlier and more often. Sadly, I have to admit, I only saw 80% of the movie, because I was hiding my eyes for the other 20%.

Joost and Schulman have the audience on the edge of our seats pretty much every moment in the film, and tease and taunt us mercilessly with all sorts of strange images and shocking appearances by the unexplained. In one of the most brilliant uses of a camera I have ever seen, they put one on an oscillating fan, which moves back and forth, making the audience worry what is going to be on screen when the camera comes back to the side where it was just a few moments ago. AWESOME!

Like the previous movies, this one is not all that concerned with advancing a story or teaching us more about the characters, but Paranormal Activity 3 delivers the gut punching frights, especially as we worry about the two cutest little girls you have ever seen in a horror movie. However, I was shocked at how many scenes promoted in the trailers were cut out of the movie.

Paranormal Activity 3 is rated R for some violence, language, brief sexuality and drug use.