Paranormal Activity 2 (2010) Review

This movie isn't so much a sequel (like the title would suggest) as a prequel. It's an inferior film that, considering how much I liked the first Paranormal Activity, was a major disappointment.
Daniel Rey (Brian Boland) and his wife Kristi (Sprague Grayden) have just brought home their infant son, Hunter. They live in a large house with Daniel's daughter Ali (Molly Ephraim), their nanny Martine (Vivis Colombetti) and their German Shephard Abby. As it turns out Kristi is the sister of Kathie who you might remember as the victim of a haunting in the first film. Both Kathie and her boyfriend Micah make several appearences in the film. One night the Reys return home to find their entire house vandalized. Furniture is thrown across the floor, the television is smashed etc. Assuming they are the victims of a break-in (interestingly there was nothing stolen and no signs of forced entry) the Reys set up video survellience cameras around their house. As the cameras record strange things happening night after night Ali, after a extensive amount of research on the internet, assumes that their is a demonic entity in the house that is after Hunter. Bet you wouldn't have been able to guess that she's right.

Like I said this was a major disappointment. Basically this how almost all the events transpire. Nothing happens, nothing happens, loud bang, nothing happens, nothing happens, louder bang, nothing happens, things move around by themselves, nothing happens, demon attacks and it's over. The subtleties and illusions utilized so well in the first film have, for some strange reason, been replaced by cheap jump scares. For those who are unfamiliar with jump scares allow me to elaborate. Often there will be silence which is suddenly interrupted by a loud noise or fast action with a sharp musical chord. If you have ever been sitting in a room by yourself with your attention on something interesting and someone comes in to the room and causes your shoulders to leap up suddenly in brief terror. Well, you have been jump scared.

A major issue is the camera angles which are all too far away or too fuzzy to really see the characters faces when they are scared. As a side effect of that we are not scared because we cannot empathize with them. The characters are like faceless mannequins so who cares about their plight? I certainly don't and I really don't think you will either.

★