After a young, middle class couple moves into what seems like a typical suburban “starter” tract house, they become increasingly disturbed by a presence that may or may not be demonic but is certainly most active in the middle of the night. Especially when they sleep. Or try to.--©Official Site
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Reviews
Total Film
Jamie Graham
"Not since Carpenter’s Halloween has the frame been used this ingeniously, viewers having to focus pull as they sweep left and right for the impending threat. Now that’s scary."
19/11/2009
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Variety
Dennis Harvey
"Peli's original ending wasn't as terrifying as much of what came before, but delivered a cruelly ironic final twist. A new, more fantastical finish goes for a couple of jolts that are perhaps more genre-conventional. Still, they certainly do the trick."
25/09/2009
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The Scotsman
Alistair Harkness
"The reason it works so well is that Peli has a clear understanding of the limitations imposed by his lack of resources – and a canny way of turning them to his advantage."
27/11/2009
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Time Out
Nigel Floyd
"‘The fear of what happens at night while you are asleep,’ director Oren Peli has observed, ‘is a primal one that everyone has in common.’ It’s this feeling of vulnerability that Peli’s slow-burning supernatural chiller so effectively exploits, fashioning heart-stopping scares out of almost nothing. "
26/11/2009
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Channel 4 Film
Anton Bitel
"This is like a masterclass in horror minimalism, where the tension is allowed to build - steadily and gradually - to an unbearable level, until just the merest sight of the couple asleep in their bedroom starts causing the viewer to sweat and fret in anticipation of whatever is coming next."
30/06/2010
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Empire Magazine
Simon Crook
"An Amityville for the YouTube age: potent, primal and genuinely frightening."
30/06/2010
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The Financial Times
Nigel Andrews
"If we critics expected to be a little more scared, that is only because the screams coming across the Atlantic have been seismic. Strictly judged, didn’t the story and characters need more development? All we get to know of this couple is their suggestibility, their hyperkinetic mannerisms by day and their sound sleeping patterns at night, when not woken by Judgment Day thuds."
26/11/2009
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The Guardian
Peter Bradshaw
"Writer-director Oren Peli has hit on such a simple idea, and such a low-cost way of making it work. How has it never been done before? Well, part of Peli's skill is making it look easy, and he has elicited tremendously believable and relaxed performances from Featherstone and Sloat."
25/11/2009
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The Independent on Sunday
Jonathan Romney
"Don't expect CGI clouds of ectoplasm: the scares here are strictly bargain-basement, even reduced-for-clearance: a chandelier swings, a shadow looms and things go bump! – and then thump!, to ensure you're getting your money's worth. Peli's film revives the honourable tradition of chills-by-suggestion, whereby what we don't see is far scarier than what we do. In fact, the very eeriest moment is a lengthy shot in which we just gaze at an empty room, and dread what will come next."
29/11/2009
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The Los Angeles Times
Betsey Sharkey
"Before the lights go back up -- and at some point you may wonder whether they ever will -- there will be a very tight coil of anxiety buried deep in your gut that is very hard to get rid of."
03/10/2009
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The New Statesman
Ryan Gilbey
"Showing Paranormal Activity to young horror fans would be like expecting prog-rock enthusiasts to be wowed by skiffle. But after half a decade of torture-porn, it represents something of a palate-cleanser. And your pleasure will doubtless be intensified if you follow my experience of watching the film and a) sit in the front row, b) see it at night in the company of a large and susceptible audience, c) walk home alone afterwards and d) happen to be a big girl's blouse."
26/11/2009
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The New York Times
A.O. Scott
"By any serious critical standard, “Paranormal Activity” is not a very good movie. It looks and sounds terrible. Its plot is thin and perforated with illogic. The acting occasionally rises to the level of adequacy. But it does have an ingenious, if not terribly original, formal conceit — that everything on-screen is real-life amateur video — that is executed with enough skill to make you jump and shriek."
09/10/2009
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The Observer
Jason Solomons
"What's really at play isn't a demon or poltergeist which knocks keys off the table or makes the bedroom door snap open; rather, it's the relationship the characters develop with film itself, an obsession with watching and recording footage."
29/11/2009
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The Daily Telegraph
Sukhdev Sandhu
"What’s even nicer to report is that Paranormal Activity is more than a commercial triumph. It’s a conceptually tight and very efficient updating of the classic haunted-house genre. It won’t be giving most people nightmares. It probably won’t have them lining up to see it over and over again in order to get their requisite fright fix. But it will jolt, mildly disturb and hang around in the imagination like a bad smell. That’s a result."
26/11/2009
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The Times
Kevin Maher
"The execution, however, is everything and here debut director Pell proves a master manipulator who can imbue everyday objects — a creaking door or a billowing bed-sheet — with terrifying significance. On the downside, and much like The Blair Witch Project , it crescendoes and then simply peters out. But the trip is everything."
28/11/2009
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The Sunday Times
Cosmo Landesman
"For a first-time DIY film, Paranormal Activity is a remarkable achievement, but ultimately it’s just not scary enough to be considered a horror classic."
29/11/2009
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The New Yorker
Bruce Diones
"There is not much to look at, but this failing, paradoxically, holds the attention. Peli understands that the root of true fear is in waiting for something to happen."
26/10/2009
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