Paramount Pictures
A deliberately low-tech scene from “Paranormal Activity.”

LOS ANGELES — As bloodsuckers, crazed killers and things that go bump in the night crammed the weekend box office, Paramount Pictures claimed the top spot with its microscopic-budget “Paranormal Activity,” which took in $22 million and continued to build audience momentum.

“Paranormal Activity,” an independently produced thriller picked up by Paramount’s DreamWorks unit, cost only about $10,000 to produce and has been marketed with a combination of conventional advertising and cheap Web-based tactics. After a little more than a month in theaters, it has taken in about $62.5 million and appears poised to become a blockbuster on the order of “The Blair Witch Project” or “My Big Fat Greek Wedding” — tiny films that took in hundreds of millions of dollars at the worldwide box office.

Paramount’s good luck came at the expense of Lionsgate, whose “Saw VI” placed second for the weekend in North American theaters, with just $14.8 million in ticket sales.

It was by far the weakest opening for any of the films in the torture-tinged franchise that began with “Saw,” which had about $18.3 million in ticket sales on its late-October opening weekend in 2004 and went on to take in about $55.2 million at the domestic box office.

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