Official Synopsis
Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones expands on the world created by the phenomenal horror franchise with an intense tale of black magic, superstition and possession set in a gritty urban environment.
First, let me applaud the folks overseeing the Paranormal Activity series. They have tried to get off the beaten path from film to film, and especially with this most recent release. They’re trying really hard to not only break away from the story of Katie and Micah, but create a very separated gap between the stories and expand this evil universe that somehow weaves and connects back to one place. It’s a bold move, and one that could end up tripping on its own feet, but at least they are trying to make this world bigger than just a single couple in a single house. Most horror movies this day live within their own comfort zone of what works (and what is successful) and never truly stray too far away from that formula. Paranormal Activity takes chances and you have to respect that, even if the chances end up failing ultimately.
Having said all that, I think Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones is probably the furthest the series has gotten away from the original film.
The Marked Ones follows a recent high school grad named Jesse (Andrew Jacobs), who has been hearing and seeing strange things in a downstairs apartment where a woman named Anna (Gloria Sandoval) resides. Bored during the summer, Jesse and his friends explore her apartment via a GoPro camera only to find that she is practicing witchcraft, which is not as disturbing as how she is practicing it. Shortly after discovering her witchcraft methods, Anna is killed and a local kid named Oscar is the suspect. Then things start to get weird. Jesse, while breaks into the crime scene after hours and begins to explore Anna’s home. While there, he is bitten and things start getting really weird.
I won’t say anything more about the story, as I don’t want to ruin it. Just know that things come full circle from this movie to the first (enjoy figuring that one out).
Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones isn’t a terrible film. I think fans of the series will enjoy the creepiness of it, and there are plenty of creepy moments (especially with the Simon). That creepiness will be the main draw to the film and might be enough for the fans of the series. That is understandable and fine because some of the worst horror films have some of the best scary moments (Rob Zombie movies are good at this sort of thing, but generally really bad).
For me, creepiness simply isn’t enough. I need more from the horror genre, and while The Marked Ones certainly delivers a bit more, it does so in a shaky fashion. The biggest fault of the film is that the transition from plot point to plot point seems a uneven and sort of working through the motions. Every Paranormal Activity movie tries to throw the viewer off the predictability trail that the horror genre tends to make more often than not, but The Marked Ones is different. Instead of the great ‘build’ that this series is known for doing very well through various freaky incidents, this one seems to just jump from weird to weird, but contains no build leading towards the end. For me, that was the rush with the previous films. They led the viewer into a worse and worse situation as the story progressed. For example, in the first film we see the demon’s involvement in Micah and Katie’s life slowly start to take shape and build until it finally hits this beautiful crescendo of horror at the end. I could still watch the first film and get goosebumps at certain spots only because of that build. With The Marked Ones it’s more of an evenly placed set of incidents that don’t create a build, at least not as powerfully entertaining as the first four films. It seems to string the viewer along and doesn’t quite connect from point to point as the story unfolds. You the viewer are looking for one incident to build into another and it never quite gets there.
In short, the film certainly has its moments of scary, but never quite starts climbing those horror stairs that the previous films went up on their way to the big reveal at the end (which is a really cool ending, though a little confusing). This certainly doesn’t mean the film is bad, rather its just bland because of that lack of build.
Again, I do applaud the filmmakers for trying to take the series and stretch it out in a new direction, but this time I think it simply didn’t work, which is sad because this scenario was perfect for the overall series.
Shifting gears a bit, the Blu-ray version of this movie is transferred well, but like the films in the series before it on Blu-ray, the video is supposed to be mid-quality to help bring out the story a bit more. What does that mean for you? Well, the video is going to have some noticeable quality issues, though I think there are more details in the HD version than the DVD version. You’re going to get some compression and color banding, but again I think that was on purpose. There are moments of beautiful video and good clarity, but for the most part it’s home video style like the other films. I’m not sure the HD format has anything over the SD format other than some minor details you may not clearly see perfectly during the film (details matter in this series).
As for features, here’s what you’re looking at:
– Unrated version of the film
– Theatrical version of the film
– Found Footage
I still like that each one of the Paranormal Activity films is still carrying that ‘it could be real’ aurora around it. You don’t get ‘making of’ featurettes because of that, nor do you get gag reels (I would die to see those in every movie, but I’m happy they aren’t included). Simply put, the filmmakers and studio don’t want to break away from that believability they have established with the previous movies. I do really like that about these films and their home video releases.
