When we last left off, I was totally put off by the last numbered entry in the years spanning series. Before I started this, The Marked Ones was the only sequel in the series that had gotten me interested and actually wanting to go to a theater. But, seeing as I hate the theater and especially hate going alone, I didn't see it. Now I'm getting the chance. I was fully prepared for the parade of disgust to continue. Luckily, it was mostly positive.
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| ":GASP: Where are all the rich white girls!" |
The Marked Ones takes a big leap in setting and goes to a barrio in California. Instead of the hauntings happening in a pristine suburban environment, we now get to see everything in a tight urban area and welcome changes in scenery instead of being locked into a home interior. We're also fortunate in that the characters are totally different. They're funny, act totally normal for their age. Comes off as very natural. So, at least from a presentation stand point, things are looking up and feeling pretty fresh. The Marked Ones is also shot a little differently. The cast is pretty much a group of lower middle-class kids. So they don't have a ton of money to rig their whole house with HD cameras and junk. You mostly get to see the movie through one camera that a character buys in the first five minutes. There's also no watching people sleep for over half the movie or staring at empty rooms. There is always someone operating the camera.
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| Puberty for Jesse went horribly wrong. |
We get to follow a young man named Jesse who's just graduated high school. You spend the first bit of the film learning about the people around him and his home. Just seeing him be a post high school kid. Everything starts getting interesting when Jesse and his best friend Hector start messing with the crazy old lady that lives underneath him that people claim is a witch. The boys film her doing a strange ritual in her apartment and not long after, she turns up dead and they see another boy they know leaving the scene. Well, being the curious youngsters they are, the crew investigates and soon start being affected by the supernatural. Mainly Jesse. Throughout the movie you also get to see ways The Marked Ones is connected to the rest of series, which they do in a neat way. Something I also appreciated is that it isn't the same old shit, objects moving on their own and all that. They go over the top and show off some of that budget they have. Instead of implied supernatural things, it's right in your face. There's no high tension, suspenseful horror at work, but damn if it isn't fun. I think there's also a bit of a drug addiction metaphor going on towards the middle of the movie, but it gets dropped once the supernatural is very obvious.
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| You will watch them talk to Simon for minutes. |
Now, I'm gonna go out there and spoil the fate of our characters. Because if you've seen any of these movies you know what's gonna happen. That's right, the bad guys win for the fifth time in a row. The characters you've been getting invested in all die off camera and if you're lucky you actually see a body. I mean, I don't need the villains to get totally defeated. But I'd like for someone to make it out or something. Though they do take it to the bad guys a little. A group of gang members end up encountering a group of witches and shotgunning a few down which is a bit satisfying. In the end though, other than being interesting, the end is unsatisfying. That may be the only thing keeping me from totally loving this movie. But I certainly don't regret watching it and might even do so again.
So we have all the official Paranormal Activity movies out of the way and I'm really looking forward to the change of pace. So until next time, don't be afraid to be a little scary.
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