Homecoming

You have to know. You gotta know. You gotta acknowledge this. I just watched a film in the cinemas today! After 6 weeks of not going to the cinemas, I finally got to go to the cinemassss. so happy man. I traveled all the way from my small town Beppu to a much bigger city Oita by train, taxi and bus. The mall that has this movie theater is located quite far from the actual city itself, but the location and the building kinda reminds me of Mall of Asia in Philippines. The mall is called Tokiwa Oita Wasada Town or idk, something similar to that. I wish there are better films for my going-again-to-the-cinemas event, but actually Paranormal Activity 4 would do just fine. Through this, I learned that may be patience is really a virtue because that feeling of comfort in the cinemas is unbeatable even by the most expensive sofa or sound system in some ridiculously enormous mansion. Anyway, in this post I would like to review PA4 but also include a quick review of one of the nicest films I've seen, Ruby Sparks.

Main event: Paranormal Activity 4
I have to admit that Paranormal Activity series is my favorite horror franchise, although calling it a horror film may be an insult to some of the real horror films. If you've read my last post, you'd understand why I chose this particular film to watch in the cinemas. I watched the film alone, since my friends isn't that interested in watching this film. Paranormal Activity 3 is quite thrilling albeit its lack of footage that was shown in the trailers and also its (kinda) disappointing ending so I was quite intrigued about where does this fourth installment going to take us. The story have sort of moved from Katie's family to a neighbor's family 5 years later after Katie took Hunter from Kristi's house. Apparently this family adopted Hunter and that creepy guy Toby was tagged along. And someone in the family taped this whole affair and the paranormal activity started to happen, as always.

To be honest, the film is disappointing. The film is a bit boring unlike the other three films and the 'activities' isn't memorable or really scary. It's just random objects moving without anything happening. Sometimes something really good comes up and was kinda scary but it ended up being nothing. Everyone would remember that the most memorable 'activity' in PA2 is the afternoon bit where suddenly the kitchen just blowwssss. and the one in PA3 is the levitating kitchen. And in PA4......nothing. And they make surveillance cameras out of laptops and Kinect, which, to me, is amazingly ridiculous. There is a homage to The Shining though but not good enough to cover the big hole created by the whole film. The amount of ghost violence is also reduced due to strange editing, which is a bummer. The people in the family are not likable enough for us to root for (the Alex girl is cool but it's largely because of her being so cute). I wish they go back to the sequel quality of PA3 or PA2 for the fifth one and make it a more interesting story that's more cohesive the whole series. (I'm still waiting to see that burning house). I'm not going to compare the sequels with the original because the original is just the most effective without the legend and the cult stuff. It's quite safe to say that Paranormal Activity 4 is the worst of the series*. Paranormal Activity 4: rated 1/4

*I didn't regret watching it in the cinemas though

Side dish: Ruby Sparks

Ruby Sparks is a new film from the directors of Little Miss Sunshine and it stars Paul Dano and Zoe Kazan and also famous supporting casts. It tells the story about a struggling writer who by accident bring his fictional character from his book to life. Most interestingly, this character is the girl he always dreamt of to be his girlfriend. I like this kind of film, a romance blended with fantasy but not too much. Paul Dano is amazing as usual and Zoe Kazan is brilliant as she also wrote the story herself. You may think that this is a weird film, but it's like (500) Days of Summer's realism meets Stranger Than Fiction which equals to a nice, sweet, heartwarming film. The film is a study to relationships much like (500) Days and the film made you realize something important, which can vary to each person. If you like Little Miss Sunshine and (500) Days of Summer then you'd like Ruby Sparks as much as I do. Go see it! Ruby Sparks: rated 3.5/4.


I may review some other films, or just post random posts but just to be sure, I'll be back on early December with the review of Skyfall. Until then, さよなら.