Entertaining but far from anything special

Rating: 4/10 (20 December 2012)

First of all, there is no concept or premise for a film that can't be done well. The trick is what you do with that concept. The problem with Paranormal Activity is that it simply does not do anything with its concept. Furthermore, it does not have strong enough presentation to transcend its lack of originality. For these reasons the movie is fundamentally unoriginal and approaches gimmick.
"Found footage" is usually used sparingly in most movies for good reason: it is hard to film an entire movie in this fashion without growing repetitive or sluggish in its pacing. Some of the movies that used this successfully were Cloverfield and obviously Blair Witch. Cloverfield brought the concept of "found footage" to "godzilla" and it managed to work as something that had not been tried before. Blair Witch had the advantage of being the pioneer that brought this concept to the mainstream so it felt "fresh". Paranormal Activity draws attention to the found footage, and beg questions like "WHY DO THEY NEVER TURN THE CAMERA OFF?" or "WHO TOOK THE TIME TO EDIT THIS?"
The actors are not particularly good or bad. Since you are watching these characters for the duration of the movie, this does not bode well. In order to keep an audience entertained by watching two people talk the entire movie, the performances need to be exemplary. These actors, simply are not exemplary.
Watching this movie for what it does without any preconceptions I thought it began well and ultimately did nothing special. In fact, it did a few things very poorly.
There are no themes to glean from this movie. There is no point. There are no memorable performances. The camera-work is intentionally poorly done. The only element that was well implemented was the sound. It is a safe bet that the only reason this movie is so successful is that the human instinct to jump at loud noises still works. At least the creators understood this concept and used it to their advantage.
The characters have no depth. I don't know what either of them do except get tormented by demonic forces. I remember the guy was a day-trader. There is no past revealed to either character except that the lead has been possessed her entire life anyways. The only personality trait is foolish aggression on the part of the boyfriend, who actually does nothing with this aggression except yell on occasion. This is the greatest flaw of the movie. When you have characters with no personality, no depth, no arc, and they are played by amateur actors, it is virtually impossible to make the viewer care about their plight. It actually magnifies their stupidity because it is the only thing we are presented with.
This movie is sort of like a glorified haunted house ride. You sit down and wait for loud things to happen. Once they happen they don't exactly make sense and there is no rhyme or reason as to how everything fits together. You jump, and then wait for the next scare. You hop off the ride with your heart pounding for a few seconds, and then you go buy some cotton candy. Yet, there is nothing truly disturbing about the experience, and the only thing that scared you was the anticipation of hopping on a "scary" ride that is actually not scary on its own without the reputation it carries.
There are innumerable problems with this movie's internal logic. It would be one thing if the movie did not delve into what made the "villain" work. However, the entire movie seems to be about two people trying to figure out what this supposed demon is trying to do. They scour the internet and hire ghost whisperers making the audience pay a little too much attention to the details rather than the atmosphere.
For a movie that is attempting to rely on the fear of the unknown, way to much emphasis is placed on the "lore" or "mythology" about demons which only exposes how little the filmmakers actually know about such beings. If the demon's desire was simply to possess the lead character, no tangible reason is presented for why it insists on blowing doors closed, rustling covers, or walking around the house for no understandable reason. If the demon is trying to take over a soul it does not stand to gain anything by dragging its subject's body around the house. The only questions this raises is why none of the characters think to even arm themselves.
Unlike superior movies in this genre like the Exorcist where the demon's goal is to cause humans to despair, this demon doesn't seem to know what it wants. In fact, neither do the main characters. It would seem obvious that these characters would not want to be possessed, yet, they both seem very content to coax the enemy into attacking them further without becoming anymore creative than placing some dust around the house.
Ultimately, this movie has some good moments. Yet, these moments take a long time to arrive and when they do it leaves the audience with no reason as to why they did not happen sooner.
This movie can certainly be entertaining for its jump scares. Yet, this movie can't offer anything else than cheap thrills. It is perhaps a classic example of style over substance. It is simply madness with no method. The only impressive thing is that, after numerous sequels, the creators still have not done anything new with the material.
My subjective breakdown of the movie's major elements: Cinematography 5/10 Editing 2/10 Art Direction 5/10 Sound 8/10 Special Effects 6/10 Acting 6/10 Pacing 2/10 Characters 2/10 Theme 1/10 Overall 4/10