Tuesday, October 04, 2016

Paranormal Activity: Ghost Dimension


(2015) **1/2

At this point the narrative for the Paranormal series is so complicated that I am not going to attempt to summarize it here. The 6th and final installment attempts to answer all the questions posed in the other 5 films (number 5, “The Marked Ones” was technically not a sequel). In ‘Ghost Dimension’ a new family moves into a house including Ryan, his wife Emily and their daughter Leila. Ryan’s loser brother, Mike, also moves in following a recent breakup. One day Mike stumbles upon a box of…wait for it…VHS tapes and a giant video camera. Fascinated by the camera for its odd appearance Ryan discovers that when looking through the viewfinder you will see ghostly apparitions. As anyone who has seen any of the films in this series the rest of the story involves things that go bump in the night and a demon named “Toby” who wants to take Leila’s blood so he can assume human form and take over the world. 



Those who have invested time in this film series will be greatly disappointed by the sloppy, unsatisfying conclusion. Characters that were essential in previous installments are all but forgotten here. The current crop of characters are so stupid and make such illogical choices (e.g. would you let your little daughter sleep alone in her bedroom after a demon already attempted to poach her once?) that you will yell at the screen more than once. The “gimmick” in this installment is the 3D ghostly apparitions only seen through the old movie camera. I saw this in 2D and all it looked like to me was bad CG. I have stated on more than one occasion that the moment you use CG in a horror movie it ceases to be scary. Up until now the Paranormal films have not featured any noticeable CG and it was a mistake to add it here. Those who never liked this film series will feel vindicated that this one is a stinker and those who invested time in this series will feel ripped off.

4 comments:

Catfreeek said...

I wasn't a fan of the series and gave up on it a long time ago. I know you like this Siri so I'm sorry it fizzled out on you .

DKC said...

I think I saw the first three and then lost interest. I did really, really like the first one. It spooked me big time.

Trevor said...

I was fairly committed to this series. Saw parts 2,3,4 in the theater. Saw some of them multiple times.

Your warning that this won't satisfy fans of the series troubles me. I really have been quietly wanting closure on this series for years now. Fortunately, this is on amazon prime, so I'll get a chance to watch it this month. Thanks for lowering my expectations appropriately.

AC said...

Haven't seen any of these but will be sure not to watch this one.

Malevolent

 2018  ***1/2 It's 1986 for some reason, and a team of paranormal investigators are making a big name for themselves all over Scotland. ...