Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones – review

At the end of the credits of Paranormal Activity 4 there was a teaser for a Latin spinoff.  Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones is what became of that spinoff. While adding to the mythos it creates quite a few more questions.  The movie is well acted and at least tries new things from the rest of the series.  It takes the story in a different direction and makes things much more interesting.

Jesse, played by Andrew Jacobs, just graduated from High School with his friend Hector, played by Jorge Diaz.  When the downstairs neighbor in their apartment complex dies they sneak into her home and discover that she has many bizarre items.  Upon leaving Jesse wakes up the next day with a big bite mark on his arm.  He starts to develop odd powers, which at first seems like a boon, but soon shows signs of being a curse.

The acting is fairly decent.  Once again the producers have used actors that are fairly fresh.  They have changed a few things such as adding a brief scene of nudity, using special effects, using a Simon game to contact demons, and including time travel.  It shows that they are at least trying and attempting to give the audience some new scares and after five movies add to the storyline a bit. 

Some scenes are absolutely fun to watch.  For example, when a group of characters go into the house of the witch coven they actually arm themselves.  It became hilarious to watch the Latin gangsters shoot witches with shotguns. There are lots of aspects to this movie that are interesting and charming and thankfully they avoid doing the same bedroom camera tricks.  This movie is basically two friends playing with their new video camera.

If you are a fan of the Paranormal Activity series then you should really see this movie. If you’re looking for a stand-alone horror film, this one is not for you.   If you haven’t seen the previous movies this one might be a bit confusing.  This movie does reference a lot of the other films so it helps to have seen the others. If you can get a chance to catch this new entry to the franchise then give it a shot. You will likely enjoy it.