Monthly Archive: November 2018

Paranormal Activity (2007)

Directed by Oren Peli

Viewed on Amazon Prime

Summary: This massively influential found footage horror film did a lot with a tiny budget and crafted some memorable characters and genuinely creepy moments, even if it took me the better part of a decade to recognize that.

Sometimes the best thing you can do is to rewatch/reread/relisten to a piece of art that you’ve already experienced. It is tempting to always move on to new things, and that is a good way to get a wider range of knowledge, but taking the time to re-examine something that you thought you had a good grasp on could lead to discovering a whole new perspective on this thing in question, revealing sides of it you weren’t previously aware of. What does this have to do with Paranormal Activity? Well that’s the boat I am in right now with this film, I saw it close to a decade ago, didn’t enjoy it, and only decided to rewatch it after a discussion of found footage movies spurred by my Blair Witch retrospective. I just finished watching Paranormal Activity a short while ago and, as much as it pains me to say it, I was wrong about it.

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Lords of Salem

Directed by Rob Zombie

Viewed on Shudder

Lords of Salem may be the strangest movie in Rob Zombie’s filmography. Not just because of the bizarre visuals that appear in it, but because of how out of place this movie is when you consider the types of movies he usually makes. His arguably best known works are his reboot of the Halloween franchise and its sequel, and while I haven’t seen those yet, I can say that they probably aren’t deliberately paced atmospheric horror. Looking through his previous movies he tends toward a much more upfront style, usually involving graphic violence, as House of 1000 Corpses did, which I have previously looked at, but Lords of Salem is a complete reversal of this, featuring nearly no violence and not featuring a terrible murderer. Is this a change for the better? Let’s find out!

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