When it's successful, nothing touches found footage horror for the immediacy of its terror, its ability remove that one extra layer between the viewer and the horror on-screen, the conventions of the horror film. unreal.
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The first VHS has some of the best in the series ( second has some gems too)~ VHS as a whole is absolutely more of a 'silly anthology romp' lol but worth adding to the list if folks are just looking for more of the genre
Found footage is genuinely very affecting. It just got a bad rap from a bunch of directors leaning hard on it at the expense of interesting plot, themes, and allowing bad improv acting instead of writing.
The worst one for me was the “taking of Deborah Logan” it starts as a typical third person camera movie and then switching to first person midway through it totally ruined that whole movie for me rather than immersing me. I feel like you have to get the film style set up in a plausible way early.
The best one I’ve watched recently was: “the horror in the high desert” it got me by acting like a documentary the reveal was when I was like oh shit this is a found footage movie by that point it was almost done.
I still get pissed about one found footage horror series that completely abandoned that in favor of being like an anime rip off and everybody else seems to love it
No I'm talking about the Midwest Angelica YouTube series. Granted it was literally found footage from a destroyed building and only had the "this camera was on a person" a few times but last time I watched it was literally just a poorly framed shot of 2 people talking in a room and copying NGE
Most of the horror I consume is internet horror and there is, or was, a lot of found footage stuff that did a good job at making you think it was really happening until the really crazy stuff happened.
It's so easy to do wrong and tough to do right, but when it's right it's gold. I watched through the entire V/H/S series last fall and I'm still thinking about some of those shorts.
When I watched Noroi on the big screen I loved it, but it struck me how much more visceral my reaction was to the original way I saw it (ripped fansubbed semi-bootlegs on a small screen) because that really sold "You're watching some Japanese tv show" to my brain, used to seeing real ones like that
"Found footage" always sounds to me like a presumptuous way to describe all movies composed of "diegetic" camera shots (that may or may not have been lost or found), but whatevs. I LOVE the inventive ways the V/H/S anthologies find to place the audience inside the camera's POV. And [rec] remains A+.
Agreed. When executed well, found footage horror can create such legitimately immersive, atmospheric and perhaps unconventional art forms. It's why I love Cloverfield and Troll Hunter, and I'd say the found footage style helped showcase the sheer scale of the monsters.
I will defend found footage until my death. so many people immediately dismiss the genre as silly, but absolutely nothing gets me hiding under the covers like a well made found footage movie. the first time I saw Grave Encounters I don't think I took a single breath until the end.
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-Lake Mungo.
-Cloverfield.
-As Above so Below.
-Grave Encounters.
Those are some of the best and most creepy or fun
Haven't seen the others, sadly
But when it's good, it's great.
Most of the horror I consume is internet horror and there is, or was, a lot of found footage stuff that did a good job at making you think it was really happening until the really crazy stuff happened.