Found Footage Movie List #3
#3-1
Release Date: September 6th, 2012
Genre: Horror/Anthology
**DISCLAIMER: This movie contains graphic depictions of blood and gore, language, explicit nudity, sexual situations and mild drug use. Viewer discretion is advised.**
Summary:
Winner of the Sundance Film Festival 2012 Award.
When a group of petty criminals is hired by a mysterious party to retrieve a rare piece of found footage from a rundown house in the middle of nowhere, they soon realize that the job isn’t going to be as easy as they thought. In the living room, a lifeless body holds court before a hub of old television sets, surrounded by stacks upon stacks of VHS tapes. As they search for the right one, they are treated to a seemingly endless number of horrifying videos, each stranger than the last.
Bringing together some of the top filmmakers in the game today, this wickedly conceived horror anthology sends the viewer through a gauntlet of suspense, terror, shock, and downright brutality—instantly distinguishing itself from a sea of lackluster found-footage horror flicks. The diverse and deviously creative minds behind V/H/S shatter any preconceived notions about the genre, making it feel inventive and captivating once again.
Today on my Found Footage Movie List I have a double-feature. Instead of highlighting one movie in this post, I’m discussing two films of equal magnificence. The first being V/H/S.
Previously included at #1 in my Halloween Movie List, V/H/S is without a doubt a uniquely terrifying anthology film with five segments depicting horrible things happening to (sometimes) ordinary people. Throughout the five segments there’s a main narrative being told, a group of hoodlums breaking into a home and watching these horrific short films.
Each segment is shot in the found footage format, giving the entire movie an extra edge of horror, as the lack of music “professional” editing takes away any notion that something is coming. In most horror films you can tell something is about to happen by the way the music is playing, or if it abruptly stops; but not in this film. There’s no way to see what’s coming to make you scream until it’s too late.
My favorite segment, if I had to choose, would be “Amateur Night.” Following the exploits of three college boys just looking for some fun, things take a very terrifying twist when one of the girls they’ve picked up is a demon.
Each segment, including the main narrative, is uniquely scary in its own right. Sex-hungry demons, murdering lesbians, ghosts on Skype, Slender-Man (or a version thereof) and botched exorcisms… there’s no way to NOT like this movie!
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#3-2
Release Date: June 6th, 2013
Genre: Horror/Thriller/Anthology
**DISCLAIMER: This movies contains graphic depictions of blood and gore, language, nudity, sexual situations, blasphemy, and ritualistic sacrifice. Viewer discretion is advised.**
Summary
The search for a missing teen leads two private investigators into a derelict house littered with mysterious VHS tapes in this sequel to the hit horror anthology V/H/S. As the detectives scan the videotapes in search of vital clues, what they find instead is a series of tales so shocking they are driven to the edge of madness. Genre specialists Simon Barrett, Adam Wingard, Jason Eisener, Edúardo Sanchez, Gregg Hale, Timo Tjahjanto, and Gareth Evans lead viewers on a terrifying ride into a world where your worst nightmares come true.
It’s very rare when anyone can say they loved the sequel to a movie just as much, if not more than the original. V/H/S/2 is definitely one that you can say it with.
When this movie came out, I was one of the many clamoring to see it. Having been in love with the first movie (see previous title) I knew I’d like this movie, even if Only to a lesser extent. I figured sequels aren’t as good as the original (just look at what I have to say about Paranormal Activity) and although I had high hopes for this movie I was prepared to be slightly disappointed, my standards having been set so high by the first movie. But when I finally saw this movie it not only met my standards but surpassed them altogether.
Set in the same found footage anthology format, this movie follows in the steps of its predecessor with four short segments of horror and gore, all seen through the viewing of the characters in the main narrative. More is revealed in this movie as to why these tapes exist, and what it does to someone should they watch them in a certain sequence. It ties in very well, the main narrative giving clues as to what happened in the first movie and hints as to why it happened in the first place.
Each segment brings a new kind of horror to the movie: poltergeist seen through a camera built in a man’s eye, a gritty zombie invasion from the perspective of the zombie, a religious cult trapping a film crew in their compound to sacrifice, and an alien abduction. All of this woven into the main sequence of two detectives searching for a missing teenager who, for some sick reason, owns all of these tapes and wishes to make his own.
The entirety of this film is terrific. Shocking, terrifying, thrilling, and at times gross, both movies have earned their shared #3 spot on my Found Footage Movie List.
-Michael
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