Paranormal Activity: Next of Kin, 2021.
Directed by William Eubank.
Starring Emily Bader, Roland Buck III, Kyli Zion, Dan Lippert, Wesley Han, Henry Ayres-Brown, Colin Keane, and Emerald Rose Sullivan.
SYNOPSIS:
Margot, a documentary filmmaker, heads to a secluded Amish community in the hopes of learning about her long-lost mother and extended family. Following a string of strange occurrences and discoveries, she comes to realize this community may not be what it seems.
There is a line between bravery and stupidity, and the characters of Paranormal Activity: Next of Kin, unsurprisingly, cross into the latter. This is to be expected although I suppose there was a glimmer of hope that with a filmmaking team of director William Eubank (2020’s underappreciated, Underwater) and Blumhouse regular Christopher Landon writing the script, there would be something that bucks the trend of these experiences (of which there are far too many with no one seemingly asking for more, at least to my knowledge).
Emily Bader is Margot, a standard young adult with a dark past. As such, she takes advantage of the Internet to look into her ancestry. Margot turns out to be related to an Amish man named Samuel (Henry Ayres-Brown), who may have some answers or information about why her mother abandoned her as a baby. Together with her friends Chris (Roland Buck III) and comedic relief and encyclopedia of random information Dale (Dan Lippert), they set out to the middle of nowhere to make a documentary about where she comes from. And if you’re wondering how they get connected in the first place, there’s a bunch of exposition about how Samuel left the community for a year and conveniently got put into touch with Margot.
The front and center problem here is how immensely tedious Paranormal Activity: Next of Kin, seemingly taking forever to set up scares, ever so slowly hinting that these Amish people are up to no good. The group spot people going out to the woods at night, which they are told in response to not be alarmed (there are just some bears roaming the woods), an older woman is slicing her wrist in the corner of the kitchen, and the livestock is sometimes killed for inexplicable reasons.
Considering protagonists only have handheld cameras and dead phones (and nothing to charge them on, although that begs the question of how they are charging the cameras they are using since the movie takes place well over a week), it’s safe to say anyone with half a brain would find a way into town and bring the police back with them. Doubly so, one of our heroes stumbled across a mysterious hole off into the woods. Instead, Margot decides to investigate further, much to the sensible disapproval of her friends.
Even when the filmmakers start to reveal what’s going on in Paranormal Activity: Next of Kin, nothing about it feels remotely suspenseful. The characters are also dry slabs of paint, and there’s nothing necessarily creepy about the Amish people or anything interesting with their motivations. If anything, it’s as predictable as all hell, which only makes the 80 minutes of buildup to the terror all the more irritating and life-sucking.
However, those last 20 minutes are shockingly tense with excellent and sinister creature design, coupled with various shaky handheld camera work amplifying the tension (the snow continuously increases over their stay, culminating in a blizzard accentuating some of that fear) or providing horrifying angles of whatever is on the loose. It doesn’t make up for the painfully boring storytelling or generic characters, but there are quite a few scary moments during the finale. In that respect, Paranormal Activity: Next of Kin probably would’ve worked better as a 30-minute short. However you slice it, nothing about the story comes close to justifying taking forever to get to the point. With that said, there is still no reason to continue this franchise way beyond its expiration date that has done nothing here to reinvent itself meaningfully.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★
Robert Kojder is a member of the Chicago Film Critics Association and the Critics Choice Association. He is also the Flickering Myth Reviews Editor. Check here for new reviews, follow my Twitter or Letterboxd, or email me at MetalGearSolid719@gmail.com
