I really like Found Footage movies. They are cheap to make, and about 1/100 is really good, but they are entertaining to me.
shareOnly once in a while.
shareI think they have the potential to be really good but I’d argue that they’re inherently flawed. I worry that modern day technology and general cynicism makes it incredibly difficult nowadays to pull them off as ‘genuine’ found footage films, the same way the Cannibal Holocaust and Blair Witch Project phenomenon played out years ago.
shareNot really, no.
shareMost are lousy
Blair Witch and Cloverfield were very good
I really liked Project X if anyone here remembers it. It’s the found footage teen party movie that came out in 2012.
sharei love them.
even when they're awful they're great to me.
all you need to do to make a cheap movie good for me is contain the following elements:
- people walking through woods in the dark, or in dark hallways
- get frightened by random noises
- use night vision cameras.
if you throw in a goth girl, you'll give me everything i want in a movie.
why do i find that so satisfying? i don't know. i just do.
my favourite found footage films:
(rec) - truly terrifying ending. the only movie that really has frightened me as an adult.
lake mungo - masterpiece - no one is going to tell me otherwise.
hell house llc movies - all three of them. even the lousy third one.
grave encounters - first one is better, but both are great.
be my cat
butterfly kisses
nightmare code
afflicted
antrum
paranormal activity - the marked ones (i like almost all of them, but this is my favourite probably)
one cut of the dead
the den
gonjiam - haunted asylum
the poughkeepsie tapes
there are a bunch more i like and i'm sure i am forgetting tons, but those are the big ones for me.
No one mentions The Den. I really liked that one.
Did you like Creep? Or Trollhunter?
i like both creep films a lot. trollhunter underwhelmed me a bit, i have to admit. maybe it was a bit oversold to me? i'd heard so many great things about it for so long, & when i finally got to it...i thought it was fine.
i'll give it another try one of these days.
do you have your own list of favourites?
i think i'm going to do a little letterboxd project tonight/tomorrow & put together a list of my favourite ff films.
Mostly the ones you've mentioned although I wasn't a huge fan of Lake Mungo. I don't know why I didn't like it.
I like Trollhunter, but I agree it was a little overhyped.
I would add The Sacrament (I'm fascinated with Jonestown)
Host
The Bay
The Borderlands
Man Bites Dog (does this count?)
Zero Day
The Last Exorcism
As Above So Below
I can't really pick favourites as you can tell.
i love the sacrament! it's one of about 50 movies i really want to re-watch, but i'm not letting myself do that right now cuz i've taken a silly pledge to only let 10% of my watches this year be previously seen films.
man bites dog definitely counts.
i remember not loving the bay, but it's been many years & i want to revisit it.
zero day would definitely be at the top of my own list. host is up there too. my lb review says i really liked borderlands, especially the ending, but i have to admit right now i can't recall a thing about it.
I liked The Bay because I thought it was plausible.
I also like They're Watching but I wouldn't recommend it because the end is just bonkers and such really, really bad effects.
The Tunnel (2011) was decent as well.
There are also some that I like just for how bad they are. Hahaha.
I'm trying not to rewatch as much, but I find that trying to find something new to watch can be very stressful. Sooooo many options.
i've heard good things about the tunnel. that's one i have to catch up with. it doesn't seem to be available to stream anywhere, even as a rental, unless i'm missing it. i did find a copy of it posted on youtube some time back, but it looked like it was extremely low-fidelity. maybe i'll just break down and watch that tonight, since you've planted the idea in my head.
shareBoth were great fun movies…sorry to step into the convo but Creep really was creepy! Troll hunter had pretty good sfx
shareI'm a huge horror fan, but I can probably count on one hand the number of found footage movies I've liked. The Paranormal Activity franchise for example leaves me completely cold. All of them.
share