Review

We begin our journey into darkness with sisters Katie and Kristi discovering a box of old VHS tapes that Kristi got from their Grandmother. Seems this is set prior to events in the first movie in the franchise. We never get to see who actually plays the tapes, it would set up a major departure in the plot arc of the series if it was Katie or Kristi, but we are back in the later 1980s when anything was possible, including the World being devoured by hairspray pollution issues.

In 1988 much younger Katie and Kristi versions, under 10s, are living with Mom Julie and live in dude Dennis in a surprisingly spacious and upmarket looking house in California. Naturally since this movie has "Paranormal" and "Activity" in it's title things start to go bump in the night, kitchens self-combust, and more worryingly Kristi has a night time "imaginary friend" named Toby who wants something. It isn't long before things escalate to outright warfare and the family are fleeing to Grans. That's when things start to go really wrong in a final block that had the audience I attended a screening with screaming and running for the exits. Oh hell yeah, we're talking a solid scary movie kids. Grab onto your Leo Sayer LPs, we're going in.

To a certain extent Directors Henry Joost and Ariel Schulman are constrained by the franchise they are working in with PA3. The Audience pretty much knows what's coming and are waiting on the Directors to get their scare on, aren't we the cynical ones. So it came as something of an unpleasant surprise when Joost and Schulman managed to side step expectations and deliver a continual stream of shock tactics that wrenched up the tension to such an extent that some audience members weren't walking out they were running out. The Directors hit the sudden shocks, build to some very solid atmospheric moments, and continue to entice the Audience into the story. There are certain scenes in the movie that will stick with you long after the closing credits. Hey happy dreams kids, this one is playing for keeps. Especially look out for a homage to John Carpenter's seminal Halloween, oh and the real scare is still coming at you post bed linen. If you are one of those half arsed horror fans that don't like to be actually scared then give this movie a miss, for the rest of us a change of undies might be advisable.

Ladies and Gentlemen welcome to an all out attempt to scare the crap out of the audience

While a lot of the shock scenes might strike a chord with Paranormal Activity veterans, look for younger Katie and Kristi to reprise their torment from the first couple of movies, the Directors get it on with some new stuff. Kids running past bedrooms in the early hours never ceases to be slightly creepy, old ladies standing at windows can be chilling if framed right, and throwing half seen glimpses at the audience works like a bookie at a race met. The Directors managed to keep tension to the forefront and they do it with remarkable ability given the limited nature of the project they have on their plates. I was impressed folks; this movie is the best yet in the franchise.

In keeping with the previous couple of movies things aren't limited to the night time, there's quite a number of effective day time scares coming at you. We have one camera in the girls' room, stationary angle, one camera in the parents' palatial bedroom, stationary angle, and a remarkably effective pan camera giving a sweep from the kitchen to the lounge room. Denis, the live in dude, hooks a VHS camera up to a fanbase in one of the truly brilliant ideas coming out of the movie. This really shouldn't work, come on fixed angles, but the Directors make do with no score, ambient noise yo, and an adage that what remains unseen is the most frightening aspect of a horror flick. Yay, finally Directors who get that it's far more effective to allow the Audience to do a number of themselves, rather than hit said Audience around the head with half conceived CGI tactics. About the only problem I had was the notion that filming shite going down would be the last thing on my mind if my family was under attack from forces unknown. Whenever something goes down Dennis reaches for the shoulder cam rather than, you know, actually doing something about it.

Actually another issue I had with the movie was with the mom character who continues to deny anything is happening as babysitters flee into the night, various rooms get wrecked, and the video evidence mounts up. Just how fracking stupid is this chick!

Overall top performances from the cast, these people are real not Actors, it added to the authentic nature the franchise is maintaining. Hey this stuff might not go down on your block, but did you hear about that family two suburbs over! I'm not going to cut anyone out for special praise here, the cast is fine and every one of them, including the two kids, are kicking majors throughout the running time.

One major bone to pick with the Distributor however, what the frack happened to the stuff in the trailers, that is noticeably absent from the movie? I simply hate it when trailers are built around scenes that didn't make the final cut of the movie. While the "Bloody Mary" scene in the movie is effective, it pales for mine against what the trailer promised. On the other side of the possessed chick at least the Audience are guaranteed no relief from the relentless march of chills coming their way, everything is original to the movie the trailers don't give anything away that will detract from the cinematic experience.

To finish on a bright note, Writer Christopher B. Landon keeps the series mythology in place, there's no deviation from previous rules, while adding a whole new depth of meaning to things that went down in the first two movies. All about deals with unseen forces and promises to keep. Interestingly the one plot hole I originally thought was going down is covered by Landon, the demonic force has the ability to make people forget. Okay it might be something of a cheap out considering the first movie and prior knowledge, but it maintains the inherent logic going down in the franchise.

Overall I had a real good time with the movie, best thus far in the franchise in my opinion. I was rocking with the atmosphere, the shear tension, and the ability of the film makers to hit the horror highs with limited resources. A general return to an all-out attempt to scare the crap out of the Audience with superior film making rather than relying on gore or all out gross scenes. Naturally this isn't going to work with all viewers, let's be real here a sizeable fraction of horror's modern Audience like to pretend to be scared rather than facing their inner terror demons. A movie for those of us who believe horror should tune up the scare factor rather than the fake looking CGI to get the job done.

Out of interest I checked a couple of websites to see how the Critics are reacting to the third movie in a franchise that continues to ignore Boredwood conventions, overall pretty good with the normal anti Horror crowd dialling in with the negativity. At one major site however some clown was going on about it all being a "found footage conspiracy", as the saying goes if you try to make it idiot proof they will just keep producing better idiots.