Found Footage Movies

[Lone Wolf Leonhart]

Are you a fan?

Found footage is a genre of film making, especially horror, in which all or a substantial part of a fictional film is presented as if it were discovered film or video recordings, often left behind by missing or dead protagonists.

Notable films: The Blair Witch Project, Rec, Quarantine, Grave Encounters, Paranormal Activity

I'm a big fan of the genre. They're typically low budget, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. People like being able to feel like they're in that persons shoes. It adds a certain thrill factor to it.

One of the big complaints people have is "If you're being chased by a ghost then why don't you drop the camera?!?", which I have two rebuttals for.

1. Often times, by the end of the movie, the night vision on the camera becomes their only source of light.

2. They might figure there's no escape and so they might as well document their experience for people who might find the film in the future.

Do you have any favorites in the genre? A while back I marathoned a ton of found footage movies on Netflix and it was a really fun time.

[Ayen]

I only watched two from this genre, Cloverfield and Quarantine. My parents saw Paranormal Activity, but I didn't sit down with them to watch it because I don't like horror movies because they freak me out (yet I play a bunch of horror games no problem). I can't say it's my favorite genre ever, but I did enjoy the movies I saw. They're okay in small dosages.

[Vyk]

Paranormal activity was pretty terrible in my opinion. The characters were completely irrational and unrelatable. The writers didn't know what they were doing. The Blair Witch Project is an acquired taste, but up until the final couple of seconds I think it was alright. The ending was pretty terrible though. I love Cloverfield, however. It sets a standard on how these movies should be done. I have problems with Quarantine, but I don't hate it. I also haven't seen the original "REC." so I have little basis for comparison on how well it could have or should have been. Or perhaps it surpassed its original. I don't know. But to me it was just going down a list and checking off the things it thought it needed. It didn't feel like it had any heart or soul. But it wasn't terrible or anything. I'm thinking that's about it for the First-Person Perspective films that I've seen. I'm thinking one of the zombie movies was.. but I have a foggy memory on that one. Diary of the Dead? Or maybe it was just the intro/outro that was. I'm not sure anymore as that movie bored me and I guess I suppressed the memory. I have nothing against this genre, but I think it takes a certain talent to pull it off well

[Shauna]

I've only seen Cloverfield and Paranormal Activity (there are probably others, but these are the big names that I definitely have seen), but I did not enjoy either of them. Just not my style, I guess.

[chionos]

Nope. I hate them. They were fine at first, as a novelty. But too often it's just an excuse for lazy cinematography or cheapness.

I will say that, typically, the foreign movies among the found footage genre do manage to find an aesthetic beyond the jittery grainy mess sometimes. [rec] is a good example of this.

[Wolf Kanno]

I love the concept for the films, but I have yet to see a version of it that I enjoyed. I hated Blaire Witch project or as a my friends and I affectionately renamed it "Stupid Kids Cussing in the Woods". I don't know, it just often feels like a its used for budget reasons rather than because it's ideal for the horror.

[Ergroilnin]

Did anyone here watch Trollhunter from this genre? I found it pretty nice, it's not the same scarejump as most movies from this genre are and I loved the trolls, felt bad for them in the end too. I recommend this one.

Other than that I saw Paranormal activities, they all sucked. First one sucked because characters were as said before completely irrational and the sequels just plain sucked no need for explanation.

I also saw Grave Encounters, that gave me nightmares for a night or two. I am just not really good with that kind of ghosts.

And of course, I saw Project Blair Witch. The first one was pretty decent I guess, it's kind of cult movie now. The second one sucked hardcore tho.

EDIT: Just saw Cloverfield. Loved it. Need moar like that one!

[Lone Wolf Leonhart]

@Vyk

You're right, Diary of the Dead was the zombie flick all filmed in the hand cam style. I enjoyed it, though. I'd like to watch it again at some point.

[Scotty_ffgamer]

I've seen all of the Paranormal Activities except the latest one. Do I think they are good movies? Not really. But I still have fun with them. My roommates and I had a kind of running gag in college based on the third movie which was fun.

[REC] was a pretty fun watch. It wasn't my favorite, but I still like it.

Blair Witch Project was pretty boring and not that memorable. But again, I just had fun watching it at the same time. It's more the memories of who I was with that made me enjoy it. We also went out into the woods on campus and walked around at 1am after watching it and a spooky ol' time.

Trollhunter is a lot of fun.

That's probably all the movies I've seen in this genre. I will say that my favorite found footage thing is probably the "first season" of Marble Hornets. Now that thing was a heck of a lot of fun to watch with my friends, and it inspired some great pranks with people on campus. I've heard that web series is down now and I should probably watch the rest of it. It did lose my interest after a while though.

[blackmage_nuke]

I like Chronicle but Im not really a fan of the found footage format. I prefer when the camera work makes a statement about the scene. Also I hate when the camera shakes because theres something difficult to film and they just cut away to a different shot, and found footage tends to do that quite a bit.

I've seen Blair Witch and Paranormal Activity but didnt enjoy them much.

[Shauna]

Ah, Trollhunter. I'd forgotten about that one. I really enjoyed it! There we go there's one.

[Ergroilnin]

Okay, just watched Chronicle and really loved that one as well but not for the shaky camera style. I felt it was more like superhero movie put in "real world" or something. Sure if you watch it as found footage, it's one of the most unbelievable among the lot, but if you watch it as superhero/villian movie with interesting twist with the recording format, it gets pretty good imo.

[Mirage]

I didn't like blair witch project, i didn't like cloverfield

[Shorty]

I think Cloverfield was awesome. Both the Spanish and American versions of [REC] scared the crap out of me, so I guess they did their job. The Blair Witch Project scared the crap out of me only because I was like twelve and watched it alone and was on edge the whole time waiting for the witch to show up and really allowed myself to be affected by the tension-procuring effects. I think if I watched it now, though, I wouldn't have the patience for it because it's an overall pretty terrible movie. Paranormal Activity I was okay. It didn't really have much substance, and I guess people forgive that for how low the budget was, but I'm eh on the matter.

I don't particularly like or dislike found footage movies, I just want them to be done well. Cloverfield is the best one I've ever seen.

[Shiny]

In film school, it was a running joke to make fun of Cloverfield and it's drunk filmmaking. Ironically, the teacher we had was the one responsible for some of the cinematography in that film. I use to hate these types of films because I thought it was lazy filmmaking. In actuality, it's really hard to make something look continuous and "invisible edit". Granted, Cloverfield is still a terrible movie. Chronicle wasn't much better to me. [REC] the original and the remake as well I enjoyed thoroughly. I also enjoyed the first VHS film which is a series of short horror films made to look like they were being filmed on someone's old camcorder.