If there's one thing that Roland Emmerich is good at, it's blowing things up on a grand scale.

As a director, he has always erred on the side of vastness. Some of his large scale filmic feats have included: blowing up the White House (Independence Day), freezing New York (The Day After Tomorrow), and ending the world (2012).

With Shakespearean thriller Anonymous currently in post production, The Hollywood Reporter has news that Emmerich is scaling down for Zone.

The under-the-radar production is apparently a found-footage thriller in the vein of Cloverfield and Paranormal Activity, and will see Emmerich working with a budget of $ 5 million (a tiny fraction of what he's used to).

There's rumours that a couple of unknowns have been cast, and that the alien invasion movie will be largely improv-based.

Emmerich's films have always been impressive in terms of spectacle, but disappointing on a character level: will these restrictive working conditions force him to up the ante in terms of story and performance?

Or is it a cynical cash-in based on the profit-to-budget ratios of recent hits like Cloverfield, Paranormal Activity and Gareth Edwards' Monsters?

Source: The Hollywood Reporter

Up for another alien invasion flick or fed up with found-footage? Rant below!

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Tags: Alien, Alien invasion, Cloverfield, Day After Tomorrow, Hollywood Reporter, Independence Day, Michael J. Fox, Paranormal Activity, Roland Emmerich

One of the things that made Paranormal Activity such a box office success was the unprecedented campaign to 'Demand It' in your local area. Having potential audience members feel involved by being a part of the reason why the film was shown in their area virtually guaranteed bums on seats.

Now Paramount have launched a new campaign to market the Paranormal Activity DVD and Blu-ray release. Like the 'Demand It' campaign, all you have to do is go and put your name, email and date of birth into a form and wallah, your name will appear on the film's DVD credits.

The 'Demand It' campaign helped build box office sales, and no doubt this latest campaign will help build DVD sales. There is also no doubt that those who participate will get a buzz in the future when they point out their name on the credits to friends and family.

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Tags: Paranormal Activity

This is hilarious.

Overture Films have produced a new ad for The Men Who Stare At Goats following the trailer style of Paranormal Activity. Absolutely brilliant.

 

Tags: Paranormal Activity, The Men Who Stare at Goats

Check out Paranormal Saw, a Funny or Die parody that blends Paranormal Activity with Saw:

Tags: Funny or Die, Paranormal Activity, Saw VI

It was billed by many people as the scariest movie ever made, so I found myself compelled to go see Paranormal Activity.

Let me first say the film is very good.  It keeps your attention and, with a purported budget of $11K (or, depending on where you read it, $15K), the director did a masterful job. Why Steven Spielberg would have considered remaking it with a bigger budget is really quite non-sensical.  The film is good just as it is.

Yet despite the hype, Paranormal Activity just isn't scary.

The twitterverse is filled with tweets from thousands of people all claiming it was super scary and the scariest film they've seen. So clearly many people found the film scary. I'm not saying those people are wrong, because the truth is how scary we deem a movie to be is very much dependent upon our mood at the time, our personal nature, and the timing of when we see the film.  In the case of Paranormal Activity, it is also very heavily dependent upon the reaction of the audience as a whole (many reviewers claim the film is a must see in the theater film for this reason).

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Business at the box office over the weekend was booming thanks to Where the Wild Things Are, Law Abiding Citizen and Paranormal Activity. Between the box office performance of all three films takings for the weekend  jumped 39% higher than the same time last year and set a new record gross for the time frame.

Where the Wild Things Are also set a record for Warner Bros, pulling in its biggest ever opening weekend haul in October (estimated to be $32.5M).

Law Abiding Citizen pulled $21M, edging just ahead of Paranormal Activity with $20.2M.

Source: Box Office Mojo / Reuters

Tags: Law Abiding Citizen, Paranormal Activity, Where the Wild Things Are

Paranormal Activity is said to be one of the scariest movies ever, providing you see it in a theater.  Watch the following footage showing audience reactions to Paramount's screening of the film at the Sherry Lansing Theater in Hollywood.  Makes me want to go see it!

Tags: Paranormal Activity

Paranormal Activity follows a young, middle class couple who move into what seems like a typical suburban “starter” tract house.  They soon find themselves disturbed by a "presence" that may or may not be demonic.  The presence is most active at night, and they decide to set up a video camera to record what is going on while they sleep, and as the nights go on the activity begins to increase in severity...

Here's the feature trailer:

Paranormal Activity will be released nationwide from October 16, 2009.

Visit ParanormalMovie.com

Paranormal Activity on Twitter: @TweetYourScream

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Paranormal Activity is an independent film that has made it against all odds.

The film was written and directed by indie filmmaker Oren Peli, who managed to pull it off for an amazingly low budget of around $15,000.  He struggled to find a home for it and, essentially, has been trying to get it out there since he made it in 2007.  At one point, Steven Spielberg saw its potential and even suggested a bigger budget remake was the next step.  The remake idea was shelved when the original started scaring the wits out of people in test screenings and the distributors realized they had something good on their hands.

Paramount eventually took control, deciding to give the film a very, very limited release.  Peli set up the online ability for fans to demand the film be shown in their area.  The two played well in tandem.  Fans began to demand the film, and Paramount continued to respond.

The above is a really shortened version of the story, but I'm cutting it short to get to the big news that just happened.

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