5. Dr. Fredrichs - Paranormal Activity
Proving that suggesting something is scary to people will make them think its scary, Paranormal Activity briefly had us believing moving sheets and dropping keys were the things of nightmares. Dont feel too bad though; apparently Steven Spielberg himself was gibbering after he first saw it. Of course its 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 one 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 its a demon. Because the plot is so slight, the psychic Dr. Fredrichs cant help but explain it all in his two brief appearances, but the fact his presence is there for no other purpose than to clarify theres a difference between ghosts and demons - he does nothing to help the tormented couple - he more than deserves to appear here.