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Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension




Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension:


To say absolutely nothing of meaning, Ghost Dimension is the best Paranormal Activity movie since 3. After a few dreadful installments in a series that never rose above mediocre, being not terrible is good enough for me, and honestly Ghost Dimension is not terrible. Is it well made? Not necessarily, but I enjoyed parts of it enough, and relative to other mainstream horror movies this year it comes out okay.

To address the elephant in the room, this is a Paranormal Activity movie. I thought the first was alright, the second was bad, the third was alright, the fourth was painful to watch, and the fifth was bad. Every sequel has had basically the same plot. A family moves into a house and their child gets possessed by the paranormal. The cinematography is always lazy, and the editing is always awful. Even the poster is the exact same. All of those things are still present in Ghost Dimension. Notably not present is Katie Featherston, the first time in the 6 film franchise in which she did not reprise her role as antagonist Katie. The signature creepy kid for this one is Leila, played by Ivy George, and to her credit she is creepy. Some neat CGI black eyes help her out with that vibe, but she plays her part fine for a kid.

I appreciate how little time the film spends waiting around for something to happen. That is usually a signature of the series, but pretty much immediately the characters are introduced, find the video footage from the previous movies, and set up cameras for the ghost to frolic in. The ghost still follows tradition by not doing much until halfway through the movie, but he moves objects in a spooky way before that. I also appreciate the relative lack of jump scares. There are a few, but only 3 or 4, and it doesn't end with one. The ghost moves with stealth, quietly crawling across the walls towards its targets. The sound effects on the whole are quite restrained. They have essentially given up the premise of this footage actually being found, but they did bother to keep the sounds realistic instead of throwing loud jump noises into it.

The visuals really impressed me, especially for its very modest $10M budget. The 3D is a total gimmick, but it's executed so well that I loved it anyway. It makes the movie creepier by a little, more fun by a lot, and it looks really impressive. Other people may have different preferences, but personally I love when stuff gets thrown directly at the audience. I do have a problem with how limited the usage of 3D was. If the ghost isn't on the screen, the 3D is out of order, so it only shows up for about 30 minutes. If you think that's a waste of money, that is completely fair, but it looks so pretty when it is used. The CGI of the ghost is nice, too, and I like how it moves. It has a sort of slither or glide to cross the house, instead of just moving in mid air.

The story took an almost interesting turn for the much hyped final chapter, which has basically no chance of actually being the last Paranormal Activity. It ties up some of the loose ends that previous movies in the series were too lazy to address. It has no way to fix every plot hole from the series, but it tries hard and solves most of the major problems. We finally get to see Toby. We learn that the entire time the ghost was an occult leader dedicated to recruiting little kids. That was pretty cool. The climax is nicely done. It tricks you into thinking that it's terrible, but at the very end a second climax happens involving Toby,
WARNING: "End of the movie" spoilers below
Who is now a human. He strangles the mother of Leila. This scene is the best done in the entire film, and maybe the entire series. The final scary thing happens, and there is absolutely no hint of a jump scare. Through lighting and atmosphere alone, director Gregory Plotkin creates a great mood as Toby slowly reaches down, grabs, lifts, and suffocates the mother.


As it tends to be, the characters are a problem. None of them are interesting in any way. I tend to blame horror movies for attaching a single trait to their characters, but a majority of this cast have no traits whatsoever. They are all interchangeable masses that take up space before they get killed off. None of them have a personality that makes me care that they get killed off. As such, the horror never actually gets scary, because I can't get an emotion beyond apathy to come out. They all make stupid decisions, all of their actions are contrived and many are unexplained, they refuse to move out of the house until it is far too late, and they hire a dumb religious guy who is blatantly incorrect in saying that the spirit is attached to the person and not the house.

As a person who doesn't even like the Paranormal Activity franchise, I thought this was a neat way to tie it all up. It's bad for a movie, but great for a Paranormal Activity movie. The positive tone of the review doesn't indicate that everyone will like it (Quite on the contrary, most people will hate it and so I needed a further explanation of why I considered it to be okay). If you have sort of liked any of the previous films, this is worth a rent on VOD, which it will be on early thanks to Paramount's consumer-friendly but financially failing new contract for their horror movies' release windows. If you've never watched one then the hole plugging will be lost on you, and if you hate them all (especially 3) this won't convert you, but it's a decent time.