9 Annoying Movie Characters That Only Existed To Explain The Plot

5. Dr. Fredrichs - Paranormal Activity

Para Proving that suggesting something is scary to people will make them think it€™s scary, Paranormal Activity briefly had us believing moving sheets and dropping keys were the things of nightmares. Don€™t feel too bad though; apparently Steven Spielberg himself was gibbering after he first saw it. Of course it€™s easy to be cynical now, but when the first in the ongoing horror franchise hit, people were positively terrified after the promise of this low budget production being €œone of the scariest movies of all time€. I didn't really see all the fuss, although being stuck in a screening full of teens ready to be scared from the beginning, screaming at the title card, may have dampened a lot of the effect. What really confuses me about the film's success is how it did so well with audiences despite nothing but the cycle of casual daytime/creepy night time occurring for most of the run time. Up until the last five minutes, all the plot development occurs in the opening quarter of an hour; Katie is being haunted, so she gets in a psychic who tells her it€™s a demon. Because the plot is so slight, the €˜psychic€™ Dr. Fredrichs can€™t help but explain it all in his two brief appearances, but the fact his presence is there for no other purpose than to clarify there€™s a difference between ghosts and demons - he does nothing to help the tormented couple - he more than deserves to appear here.
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Contributor

Film Editor (2014-2016). Loves The Usual Suspects. Hates Transformers 2. Everything else lies somewhere in the middle. Once met the Chuckle Brothers.