New thriller achieves abnormal success

David Germain | AP Movie Writer

The critics have spoken. Here's what more than a few have to say:

"Scariest movie of the decade."

"Scariest movie of my life."

"Scariest movie of our time!"

For Hollywood studio flicks, such raves usually are no more than icing on top of a marketing campaign that cost tens of millions. For "Paranormal Activity," the raves are the marketing campaign.

Those comments, repeated over and over again in various contexts on Twitter and Facebook - along with other online fan buzz - propelled the micro-budgeted horror movie to a $7.9 million weekend in just 160 theaters. That's a colossal average of $49,379 a theater, compared with $11,429 in 3,000 theaters for "Couples Retreat."

"Couples Retreat" has stars, plus the traditional mammoth studio sales push.

"Paranormal Activity" mainly has just its fans - a legion growing by the minute as more and more people post their thoughts.

"On the social-networking sites, everybody's talking about how freaking scary this movie is," said Paul Dergarabedian, box-office analyst for Hollywood.com. "This is literally capturing lightning in a bottle."

Paramount is adding hundreds more theaters today, including Lansing's NCG, a critical weekend that will help determine if "Paranormal Activity" graduates from impressive indie success to full-blown phenomenon.