The Paranormal Activity movies are some of those that you either love or hate. A lot of that can be chalked up to the found-footage format. Either you love the raw, genuine feeling of a shaky camera, or it gives you major motion sickness. But whether you love or hate them, the Paranormal Activity franchise has been widely successful since the original movie’s premiere in 2007. The movie helped launch the massive Blumhouse Productions, which is the force behind some of the best horror movies in recent years like Insidious, Get Out and Us.
Even though reviews for the movies, specifically the newer ones, have tanked there’s still something to be said about the franchise’s massive success factor. But what exactly makes this particular franchise such a hit?
Perfected the Found-Footage Format
Everyone's preferences for movie styles are different and the found-footage format is as divisive as they come. Some people hate the idea of shaky, amateur camera work, while others see it as being raw and immersive, enhancing the viewing experience. Whatever your opinion of the found-footage style is though, Paranormal Activity has perfected it.
The found-footage format was originally popularized by The Blair Witch Project in 1999. The Blair Witch Project received mostly positive reviews from critics and some audience members, but generally it served as an entry point for people into the found-footage film style and allowed everyone to form their opinions about the production choice. The jerky camera movements and weird home-video feeling are wildly different from what most people associate movies with and can come off as being cheaply made, but Paranormal Activity really took the concept and ran with it.
The use of a high-definition home-video camera was a big help here. The camera was also often either sitting on a tri-pod or some kind of level surface which eliminated the need for a whole camera crew, which helped cut costs, but also made the movie feel more believable. When you realize it's just the two people on screen and a camera, it makes it feel like everything that is happening is real. Honestly, back when the movie originally premiered, several people were convinced there was a decent amount of truth to what they were watching unfold on screen. It made it that much scarier when you thought it could be real, and the raw, mockumentary feel of the filming is the main contributor.
Cheap to Make, Yielded an Impressive Return on Investment
Paranormal Activity was about as good as making a movie can get in terms of a return on investment. The original movie from 2007 was made for just $15,000 and went on to make almost $200 million. That's an insane margin, and it's something the franchise maintained throughout the rest of the movies. Now, the fact that Paranormal Activity was so cheap to make could come off as meaning that the movie itself is cheap. While that could largely be up to individual opinion, it doesn't really seem to be the case.
The found-footage format can certainly come off as feeling cheap; again, it's a format you either love or hate, but the way Paranormal Activity did it, doesn't have that bargain-bin feel. It feels more genuine and, for lack of a better word, realistic, even with such a small budget. Obviously working with a small budget was beneficial as it yielded production a massive ROI, but it also is a large part of what made the franchise popular. Paranormal Activity was a bit of an experiment, and if it would've cost any more to make, there's a chance it maybe wouldn't have been as good or as successful. The low production cost makes it easier to experiment, with different concepts and techniques without having hundreds of thousands of dollars on the line when you're not sure how the movie will be received. This concept continued to work in the production's favor for the sequels. Even though ratings started to fall after the first or second movie, it never became a money suck for the studios behind the movies.
Scary, Fun Entertainment
While reviews and ratings have generally been tanking over the years, the Paranormal Activity franchise still delivers a certain scary, yet fun sense of entertainment that is unique to anything else out there. The Paranormal Activity movies are definitely ones that require you to suspend your disbelief to really enjoy them. They can send you through a range of emotions and reactions, from being scared to laughing, to feeling the tension and simply being bored. But if you choose to allow yourself to be immersed in the movie, no matter how ridiculous the concept may seem to you, you're sure to have at least a somewhat decent time.
There's also something to be said about the market that Paranormal Activity dominates. There isn't another global found-footage franchise out there right now. This provides Paranormal Activity with an extremely unique selling position, even if you don't like the found-footage style.
The Paranormal Activity franchise also takes a plot that has been re-imagined time and time again and revitalizes it. Everyone knows the standard haunted house trope. There are ghosts or demons or some kind of entity in the house; people move in, chaos ensues. That's the bulk of the Paranormal Activity plot. Oftentimes in these movies the protagonists reach out to a priest or someone to cleanse the house and get rid of the ghosts, or they move away. But in the Paranormal Activity movies, the characters are essentially helpless, and no matter what, the movie is bound to end in a bad way for them, every single time.
It's also true that you can find great enjoyment out of the Paranormal Activity franchise even if you don't like the movies. If you rewatch the original from 2007 today, a lot of it is laughable, maybe even a little cringe, and can make for great fun if you're watching it to poke fun at with your friends. That said though, there's still a decent amount of people out there who showed up to every new release, keeping the franchise alive for years and attempting to follow the timeline and plot points throughout the movies. Maybe you hate found-footage, but maybe the people devoted to the franchise are onto something.