Today I have two similar genre films to review this being the first the subgenre is the found footage genre. Though many hate this genre cause they feel its a dead horse being beaten over and over cause they all blame the same film franchise that being the Paranormal Activity franchise. Now I don't hate this subgenre entirely cause I will watch any found footage film looking for those ones that stand out from the rest. Trust me there are some good ones and some bad ones. I've seen my fair share in the past few years and if your lucky like I have been you can find those rare gems in the pile.
This film is the directorial debut of David Jung who wrote the script as well. Now most directors will try to get their name out there with a romp through this subgenre just to test the waters to see how they will fair against critics. I don't blame this guy for his first feature choice because honestly if I was to make a film. This subgenre would be my first choice to go through cause I don't think I would be able to swallow bitter pills if my movie was destroyed by critics. I applaud this man cause he took a chance and in my eyes it paid off cause he took a leap of faith and I was impressed.
Now the film opens to a home movie being shot of a family at a local park having a picnic. Its all happy, birds are chirping and kids are playing in the background. Its your typical happy go lucky day in the sun until the camera goes black and you hear screaming. That's when you know this one good day turned into a tragedy. Some time passes and we learn that the woman in the opening footage has passed away tragically and we are shown the man behind the camera as he has gone from being what sounded like a positive person to a man whose taking his rage out on the things his wife did. Like the psychic who told her she was bound for greatness and convinced her to go seek her dream out and that lead to her demise. Michael an atheist who becomes convinced that the supernatural played a role in wife's death decides to make his next film about these supernatural forces to disprove that God and the Devil exist.
Michael decides to interview various people about the subject matter for his film as he tries to find was to disprove it all. Even going to the point where he is involved in a sexual ritual that well comes off creepy as all hell rather than being any where near as helpful as one would think. To me the man should have just went to the damn library and read up on the shit before he went out into the world looking for answers from sources that come off as laughable and creepy. But it creeped the man out enough that he said on camera during the film that he would probably never eat food again thanks to that experience. I think the one visit to a mortician to find out that theres a drug inside a certain frog that can give us the natural experience of being dead was interesting cause who doesn't want to know that feeling? I mean what does it feel like to be dead? Is it good, bad or just a bad trip? I dunno but the police in the movie didn't find it to funny that he tried it and did in a graveyard of all places. But our boy escapes potential arrest and continues on making his film.
Now as the film progresses we start to see that he slowly starting to show signs of possession as he starts to act weird and ants start appearing all around him. His daughter begins to have nightmares about a monster who Michael thinks is just a monster and that he can chase away but to his dismay he finds out that in her nightmares that he, himself is that monster. This further pushes him down the path of trying to figure out what is going on within him as he begins to hear what he calls a mumbling voice in the back of his mind. He then begins to exhibit the signs of possession when at night he wanders the halls of his house carrying his camera and playing creeper as now possessed and now filming his own sister as she sleeps in her bed knocked out thanks to sleeping pills. Yes he feels her up.
After this his decent into madness continues as he apparently has killed the family pet, then mutilates himself by carving a pentagram into his chest, kills his friend. He finally comes to sudden realization that the mumbles in the back of his mind were the voices of angels being blocked out by the demonic forces. This leads to him fighting a battle within himself, a battle between his good side trying to believe this evil is going to cause him to hurt the one person he has left. But evil wins over and when his sister returns home and finds that he has destroyed the house and eventually brings forth her demise. It is his daughter that causes him to fight the evil inside of him to prevent him from killing her as well. All leading to the sacrifice to save his daughter's life to end the possession. The film ends showing us the tragedy that took his wife and began this whole ordeal.
I will say I was impressed with this film cause I normally after watching a found footage film feel like I wasted my time. But this one came off very well done and didn't come off hokey and cheesy like various similar movies have done. So I applaud David Jung on this film cause I felt like this is what a found footage should be. You don't need floating objects, dark figures walking around and stuff just falling down to have a cheap scare. No this movie itself comes off scary by showing you this is what happens when you don't believe in something and it just takes over your very soul. So if your a fan of this subgenre than you can find this movie on your on-demand service for probably five bucks. Watch it with your friends or your significant other cause its a good film to watch with the lights off.
reviewed by Bucky S.
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