The first two “Paranormal Activity” films were quite uninteresting, however the third installment of the series was suspenseful and creepy, which may have enticed many people to go out and see the fourth film.  Nonetheless, “Paranormal Activity 4” was a let down because it made little sense and had few scary moments.

The new horror movie is about a girl named Alex, played by Kathryn Newton, who looks after her little brother Wyatt. After Alex’s neighbor is sent to the hospital, the little boy who lived next door is sent to stay at Alex’s house. Alex and her boyfriend Ben, played by Matt Shively, sense that the boy is weird and demonic and is attempting to possess Wyatt. Throughout the film, Alex tries to prove to her family that their new houseguest is going to be the death of all of them.

Though the new film is currently making millions of dollars, many viewers are not getting their money’s worth. First and foremost, the film begins without giving the audience any indication of what occurred in the previous film. Therefore, if you haven’t seen “Paranormal Activity 3,” you will have no clue who the characters are or where they’re from.

The movie begins with words that stay on the screen a little bit too long; it is understandable that everyone doesn’t read at the same pace, however, the words took away from the realism of the movie. Also, the movie showed baby Hunter, a character in “Paranormal Activity 3,” being abducted in the beginning. The screen reads “Five years later” and somehow the kidnapped child is a ghost. The film shows no trace of how the baby died.

Unlike the previous three “Paranormal Activity” films where there’s either a camera set up in a room or a person holding a camera, the fourth movie utilized more modern technology, as the characters used MacBooks to record what was occurring in the house.

This made me wonder how the laptops were able to stay on 24/7 without sleeping or losing power. 

Moreover, after half of the movie is over, the characters seem to have forgotten about the cameras all together because although they have recorded blatant evidence of ghosts, no one mentions them. 

This film also begs the question of where the police are. Throughout the movie, not one character thinks to call the police. In one instance, Alex gets trapped in the garage by a ghost and is almost killed but after telling her parents about the incident, her father offers to take her to dinner rather than call for help.

Due to the filmmaker’s laziness, there was little significance for many things in the film, such as Alex’s tree house, which is where the evil-spirited guest supposedly goes every night in the beginning of the film, but is only found in there one night.

Furthermore, the film ended horribly as the movie suddenly showed hundreds of possessed demons walking toward Alex before the screen went black and the credits appeared; instead of showing creepy faces throughout, there were only ghostly figures until the last five minutes.

Don’t waste your money on “Paranormal Activity 4” or you will be highly disappointed. The film is comical and does not deserve to be called a scary movie.