Last night, we got a press release from Paramount saying that, following the 1 million hits the film received on its website, the studio would be giving Oren Peli’s micro-budget spooky movie “Paranormal Activity” a nationwide expansion. Except that this is, of course, a total crock of shit.
While the film has been doing gangbusters in its limited, midnight-only screenings, the studio has been planning a nationwide rollout for a little while now. We talked to a local theater manager in Connecticut early last week (where it hadn’t opened yet) that said that Paramount had already been letting the theaters know that “Paranormal Activity” was going to go wide, very soon. This was news to us, but it seemed like such a no brainer that we really didn’t think anymore about it. But then we got the press release, and the odorous fumes of bullshit wafted our way.
So whether or not the website got the million hits doesn’t really matter. Paramount was already planning on rolling this baby out wide before Halloween, which we are slightly “grateful” for, because lord knows the world needs yet another sub-“Blair Witch,” retread out there (isn’t there one a year pretty much? Meh). Still we suppose it’s better than one more Halloween where the only scary movie option is a stupid “Saw” sequel and we would have committed hari-kari to the tune of “Monster Mash.” – Drew Taylor