Chilling horror with 83% on Rotten Tomatoes to depart Netflix next month

Done with your festive feelings for the Christmas holiday period? Well, you will be if you go with today's select movie cut as part of T3's 12 Days of Streaming, where we bring you a classic flick that's either arriving or departing the best streaming services imminently. 

In horror more than perhaps most genres, it’s always hard to predict when a micro-budget movie might come along and completely change the landscape with new ideas. But that's exactly what Paranormal Activity did. It was a smash hit when it released in 2007, and after chilling on Netflix for the last year (and we don't mean Netflix'n'chill), it’s set to depart the service here in the UK on 10 January 2024.

That means you don’t have long to watch it without having to pay a rental fee, and should place it smack-bang on your list of movie options over this holiday period. Especially if you're done with, y'know, sleeping in. Call it practice for getting back up for work. You're welcome. 

Paranormal Activity took the “found footage” genre and brought it kicking and screaming into modernity (for the late 2000s) by harnessing our at that point growing interest in home footage.

Its footage comes, ostensibly, from a camera that its starring couple sets up to film their night-time slumber in the hopes of dismissing the idea that they’re in any way haunted. Without getting too pretentious, this feels eerily prescient given how many of us now have smart home cameras dotted around that could do the very self-same thing. 

The franchise might not have launched many acting careers, but the way it uses its limited budget is pretty exemplary and at times nice and inventive. Indeed, critics agreed, awarding it a respectable 83% Rotten Tomatoes score. 

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It’s a movie all about the slow burn, as you slowly see creepier and creepier goings-on, and has a gonzo ending for the ages, but there’s a reason it spawned half a dozen (admittedly terrible) sequels to date – Paranormal Activity captured some sort of lightning in a bottle, for sure.

Plus, speaking for ourselves, there’s something special about watching a slightly corny but nonetheless pretty frightening horror movie in the wee hours around the holidays – when the older folks have gone to bed, say, or if you want to watch something that doesn’t demand too much brainpower. Or you're just plain done with Santa and flashing lights over people's doorways. Go on, go spook yourself rotten.