Watched Paranormal Activity last night. I came to it with high expectations, based on a review I had read in the Guardian, recommending it highly for its subtlety. It is a film very much in the Blair Witch tradition - the unfolding action viewed through a camera set up by the protagonists.
Without spoiling too much, I think I can say that the basic premise was that a young couple, bothered by possible paranormal activity at night in their home have set up a camera in the hope of capturing concrete evidence. At first they are light hearted, perhaps only a little self-consciously displaying their affection for each other in front of the camera and before others. The intrusion of the camera is an amusing novelty in their lives. Inevitably things turn darker and escalate. I was left speculating how far the dark force that haunted them came from within or without, how far was it nourished or engendered by the tensions simmering beneath the surface of their happy relationship?
I must say I found some of the action a little slow and repetitive, even inconsequential; perhaps the refusal to deliver resolution offers more in the way of verisimilitude than tidy plot development but half way through, I found myself becoming impatient. Yes there is something in the house and it moves things around, no, wandering around in your underwear shouting at it won't help.
The exorcism reference (cut from some versions of the film) was absurd with its hints about unfortunates chewing off their own arms.
On the other hand I was clearly sufficiently influenced by the film to be just a little disturbed when my laptop started inexplicably making noises on its own in the middle of the night...
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