Whether you’re a fan of the original or not, you have to appreciate the lengths that Lionsgate went to so that the new Blair Witch sequel would be a complete surprise to everyone in attendance at this year’s San Diego Comic-Con. Shot and marketed under the fake moniker The Woods, Adam Wingard’s latest film has been eagerly anticipated by fans who were completely unaware of its top-secret sequel status.
You can check out our review here, but before you see it for yourself, we’re here to make sure you’ve seen some of the best films in the genre that was popularized by the 1999 original The Blair Witch Project. Check out the trailer for the new film below, as well as ten unique found footage films to hold you over until September 16th, when Blair Witch finally hits theaters.
A small disclaimer before I jump into the list. Found footage films have come a long way since Cannibal Holocaust. I know they’re never going to win everyone over, but I disagree that they’re movies that only offer cheap scares and gimmicky tricks. The genre truly asks more of you as an audience member than other horror movies. You have to completely suspend your disbelief before sitting down in the theater; otherwise, the movie will always be silly and will have already lost you before the first trailer plays. I understand someone hating the genre, but I think when they work, found footage movies have a chance to get under your skin and stick with you like no other type of filmmaking in existence. You just have to let them.
Now, on to the list.
The Blair Witch Project
When the marketing began for this movie, no one knew what it would become. It was already creeping people out before they even had a chance to see it with the idea that this was not fiction. Sold as actual footage found in the woods of Maryland, The Blair Witch Project told the story of three student filmmakers who set out to shoot a documentary exposing a gruesome local legend. They interview many of the citizens in Burkettsville, Maryland – and film at a nearby graveyard – before heading into the woods and encountering the true terror behind the lore.
This story structure would be copied by so many other films in the genre and is one of the reasons the producers set out to make this movie to begin with. Directors Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sanchez came up with the idea originally because they found that documentaries about the paranormal were sometimes much more frightening than recent horror films that had released and disappointed. They set out to combine the styles and create something new and did so on a shoestring budget of only $35,000.
The movie was shown at the Sundance Film Festival that year and almost immediately bought by Artisan for a reported $1.1 million. The Blair Witch Project is one of the first films to show studios that they can make an extremely effective horror movie for next to nothing and open huge to a wanting audience. This has lead to some incredibly bad and surprisingly good movies over the past seventeen years as studios try to recreate the phenomenon that this film started right before the turn of the century.
REC
Shot in Barcelona, Spain, and released in 2007, REC shows what the genre is capable of in the right hands, those hands being extremely talented directors Jaume Balagueró and Paco Plaza. The film was a major hit with critics from the start and had an unusually successful film festival run before getting a wider release. Known for creating an intensely claustrophobic atmosphere, the real star of the movie is its twist on the whole viral/rabies/zombie infection concept. Not everything is what it seems, and the third act moves things completely out of predictability.
One of the many Spanish horror films to be remade for an American audience, REC is still passed around by fans committed to having the original stand as the preferred telling of the story. The remake – under the international title Quarantine – is famous for nixing the entire twist ending and stars Jennifer Carpenter as the lead reporter who rushes into an apartment building with her cameraman, hoping to catch a newsworthy story. Definitely check out the original first and foremost for at least one example of foreign films executed much better than their eventual American remakes.
Paranormal Activity 3
It’s hard to remember a time when the Paranormal Activity franchise wasn’t a household name, and many horror fans have long lost their taste for the series. When the first film began its unique city by city release – based on an online voting system – you didn’t have to look far for someone excited to get a glimpse of the movie. After becoming a hit on par with The Blair Witch Project, the film quickly built up a base of detractors for various reasons, but still, the sequels started being pumped out every Halloween and would become a staple of the season for general audiences.
However you feel about the first film, you can’t deny that there is definitely something different and more thoughtful about the third entry in the series. Instead of continuing the story right after Paranormal Activity 2, the movie begins and ends with the main sisters of the series finding a box of old tapes and reminiscing about growing up together. These bumpers bookend a prequel that tells the original story of “Toby,” the demon that is connected to the sisters throughout their lives in the franchise.
Taking place mostly in the 1980’s, directors Henry Joost and Ariel Schulman employed a number of post-production techniques to make the film feel as if it was shot on a prosumer video camcorder. The lead character is a professional wedding photographer, which allows the movie to justify multiple cameras on the action and helps overcome some of the technical barriers a normal family would have access to at the time. Using these unique camera angles and even an unnerving moving shot help differentiate the film from the previous two. The filmmakers also pulled from classic movies of the era such as Tobe Hooper’s Poltergeist, with nods throughout the plot and even influencing how they executed certain scenes to scare fans. Overall, Paranormal Activity 3 sits above the rest of the series, even with non-fans, and can be enjoyed easily as a stand-alone film.
Willow Creek
Bobcat Goldthwait is known for making dark – sometimes nonsensical – comedies that are, not so subtly, trying to say something about the human condition. So when he announced that he was going to make a found footage Bigfoot movie, people sat up. Everyone expected it to be more of a comedy or satire, but it wasn’t at all. Sure, it was funny, but it held to a very familiar structure introduced by The Blair Witch Project and had much more in common with a straightforward horror flick. Audiences were split on whether this worked or not, but no one denies that the nineteen-minute tent sequence in the middle of the film creates an intense and horrifying atmosphere.
The story follows a woman agreeing to accompany her long-time boyfriend on a camping trip for his birthday to the same area that produced the famous Patterson-Gimlin Bigfoot footage back in 1967. They stop first in the self-described “Bigfoot Capital of the World,” Willow Creek, to interview locals about their own sightings and experiences with the legendary creature. Starting to sound familiar? Soon after, they head into the woods to try to capture their own footage and find the original meadow that originates the famous sighting. Their exciting camping trip devolves into a terrifying nightmare as a troop of the creatures find them first, begin to terrorize their camp, and hunt them throughout the night.
Bearing striking similarities to previous films in the genre, Willow Creek manages to stand apart by engulfing itself in the lore of Bigfoot and the local California legend. You do have to let yourself really believe in the found footage aspect of the story so that every twig snap and hoot makes your skin crawl. If you can do that, the ending will make you think twice about setting up a tent in the woods for a very long time.
The Poughkeepsie Tapes
With the recent ABC’s of Death and V/H/S franchises, anthology horror is making a huge comeback in the form of found footage films. The movie that did it first is still, to this day, not released on DVD or Blu-ray. There’s some kind of joke in a movie called The Poughkeepsie Tapes not being on modern formats that I’m not smart enough to make, but moving on, this is a film that is held in high regard by most of the people willing to seek it out.
A mixture of found footage and mockumentary storytelling, the film highlights the crimes of a deranged serial killer after hundred of videotapes are found, each with a different victim’s last moments recorded. This is a seriously deranged movie, and it will stick with you long after the last tape is shown. You will see people tortured and frightened in incredibly realistic ways, but unlike many of the other movies that have delved into this style, the mockumentary portion of The Poughkeepsie Tapes is integral to figuring out the whole story. If you can track down a copy and have a strong stomach, this movie is the type that ends up being passed around all over horror circles, and you can be the one to start the vomit-inducing in your own household.
Grave Encounters
Canada is responsible for more than just excellent bacon and top-tier television aboot teen angst. They’ve also given us the extremely entertaining story of a cheesy paranormal investigative reality show encountering real-life supernatural horror. Although most people Stateside have discovered Grave Encounters thanks to video on demand services, this is not your usual straight-to-DVD trash.
The movie nails the vibe of those repetitive late-night “unscripted TV” crews that go into supposedly haunted locations every week and scream in dark hallways for an hour and a half. Everything from the frat guy host to the unbelievably annoying tag-along psychic are presented in the film and pulled off perfectly. Seeing them start to run across actual paranormal phenomena and then be terrorized by it is just as enjoyable as it sounds.
Even without the best script or special effects, the cast and concept are enough to make this worthwhile of a watch. Avoid the sequels at all cost, though; this is one concept that overstays its welcome past the first film.
Unfriended
Unfriended is a movie that demands you ignore all the reasons why it should be horrible. An MTV-produced film about millennials sitting around on Skype and being killed off one by one sounds like it was thought up in a board room full of desperate studio execs trying to figure out what tweens think is cool. If you can get past that, however – and slug through a few plot-pushing coincidences – you have an incredibly unique found footage movie that throws off the shackles of its gimmick.
Following a group of friends who may or may not be responsible for the suicide of a former classmate, Unfriended has the supposed spirit returning to seek revenge on them and reveal the singular person actually to blame. As more of them bite the dust in creative Final Destination meets The Happening ways, the movie really comes into its own and demands to be taken – if not seriously – at least on its own terms.
The Bay
The Bay is one of those films that you hear exclusively about from a friend and end up watching without knowing anything about, and it really shines in that scenario and can stand with some of the best films of the sub-genre. What makes it different is its unique approach to multiple found footage sources and its ability to take on a very large ensemble story.
Set in a fictional coastal town in Maryland’s Chesapeake Bay, the plot revolves around multiple stories taking place during the city’s July 4th celebrations. The horror element is revealed to be a disease that causes human hosts to become breeding grounds for parasitic isopods. Putting a twist on the overly saturated zombie craze, the movie really focuses on its cast and using creative ways all over town and even in the bay itself to show their survival or lack thereof. That means surveillance tapes, laptop cameras, police car recordings, etc., are all used in conjunction to tell the same story of this town’s descent into chaos. Easily one of the most interesting films on this list.
The Visit
M. Night Shyamalan doesn’t have a lot of critics in his corner nowadays, but this film made some of them look up when it was released in 2015. The Visit is a found footage film made by a cinematography-obsessed director, and it shows. Shots are steady and well-composed, even though we’re to believe that a teenage girl is behind the camera the whole time. This is explained in the movie by the character being obsessed with becoming a filmmaker, but either way, you won’t think too much about it once things start getting a little creepy.
Following two children visiting their grandparents – whom they’ve never met – on vacation, the film is actually pretty funny in between the legitimate scares. This is largely due to the casting of child actors who don’t immediately get on your nerves and are cleverly written to be both the protagonists and the comic relief. Throughout the film, you’re rooting for them openly and waiting for the tell-tale twist because that’s what we’ve come to expect from M. Night. What’s great is that the movie doesn’t rely on the secretive big reveal to carry the plot and holds up on re-watches because of it. With the new knowledge you’ve gained by the end, watching again really adds to the earlier scenes and enhances them, making this one of the best Shyamalan films in recent memory.
What We Do in the Shadows
Okay, I’ll admit that this choice isn’t the best film to put you in the mood for the new Blair Witch, but it is such a hilarious and fun mockumentary that it deserves any reason to be discovered regardless. Another Sundance darling, What We Do in the Shadows takes an intimate knowledge of classic vampire lore and brings it into a modern setting. The comedy is front and center in the film, but there are so many horror movie references throughout that make this a must-watch for any fan of the genre.
Starring Jemaine Clement from “Flight of the Conchords” fame, the story revolves around four vampires in New Zealand who share a flat and all the mundane chores, problems, and lifestyle choices that come with it. Once a new creature of the night is forced into their lives, they have to cope with a young vampire who understands twenty-first century technology and culture but couldn’t care less about their history and traditions. While trying to figure out how to handle this new addition to the house, they end up confronted by werewolves, vampire hunters, and the troubles of modern dating. Now that they’ve announced a sequel following the hilarious, previously mentioned werewolves, you have every reason to check this movie out as soon as inhumanly possible.