Last post of the year 2019

Almost in the far future cyberpunk year of 2020. So, here is some blog content that was supposed to go up like several months ago. I believe this is the last of the horror/found footage movies I was watching way back.

 

Movie Marathon 24

I still remember fondly the good old days when I had daily updates on this blog for about two and a half years. Always trying to get back to that. Anyway, here have some thoughts about movies I watched like two months ago at this point.

Night Shot

 

Movie Marathon 23

Okay, let’s get this thing back on the road. The post con ennui hit me strong, mostly due to the fact that my social anxiety kicked up again. Which was why I was originally not going to come to the con this year after my brain glitched out in a similar fashion last year. But I couldn’t miss at least showing up for the last Bronycon. I’ll probably comment on my experience at the con here and there to fill up intro paragraphs over the next week or so.

The Kaos Brief
Alien found footage. A few key differences from other ones I’ve watched. This one was a bit more expansive, not just one camera on a hiking trip, but from several cameras from a social media video blogger. Also gets points for having a gay relationship between two guys as part of the cast. A bit cliche though. Pretty much hitting all the alien conspiracy checklist. So much so that there wasn’t any real narrative coherence. I’d describe this as a millennial who is a real big fan of the X-Files made a found footage movie. This movie also had some pretty bad camera work. The thing is, it was consistent enough that it might have been intentional? Hard to say with something like this. Bad shots because the people making the movie aren’t good, or because they want the characters to be not very good at it?

 

Move Marathon 22

Missed another day, oh well. Plus I’ll be missing tomorrow most likely because that’s the day I leave for Bronycon. Probably not going to post anything during the con either, so nothing new here for a week or so.

The Phoenix Tapes 97
First off, the trailer for this was nicely done. Didn’t give away anything but still gave a good sense of what kind of movie it was. Not that I was going into it blind given the description and having gotten to it via ‘customers also watched’ from other found footage horror films. This one is probably going to be aliens, which is neat. I do have a preference for scifi over supernatural as a general rule.

…and then I apparently didn’t write my reaction to it after I watched it, as the above thing was written as I started to watch it after the trailer. I remember almost nothing about the movie. So nothing special. On the other hand I don’t remember anything bad about the movie so it wasn’t terrible. Probably just a bit above average in the genre of alien found footage.

 

Movie Marathon 21

Three or four more days until I leave for the con, depending on how one counts. Though I’m still pondering just leaving early on Thursday since that’s the day the con rate reservation starts. Not that I’m going to, since I really do want to have a casual drive down, plus be rested and ready to go the day the con starts, so that means heading down Wednesday.

Survive the Hollow Shoals
I think I really like found footage horror movies. Or at least ones with aliens/supernatural stuff. At least in concept. I’d have to find one I really enjoy and not kind of like but lots of flaws. That’s fine with a favorite subject, such as myself and anime, but to get to the point of forgiving a favorite subject’s flaws there needs to be a really good example to actually set the bar for things.

This one isn’t bad, mind you. Just kind of… off. The suspense, scares, spooky nosises, and other factors that go into a found footage supernatural horror just seem to be in the wrong ratio. There is no real slow buildup. There is a bit of normal stuff at the start, then right into the seeing weird stuff and hearing scary noises, and then that continues to the end. No real escalation of minor events to major events. The movie tries, but fails at it. Plus it doesn’t manage to stay consistant with the found footage bits. There is really no reason for the main character to do somethings, except that’s what better found footage films do, and especially near the end there is no real reason for him to still be carrying around a camera. Just a few dialogue tweaks could have fixed that.

So… If you are a fan of supernatural found footage horror, might want to give this a try. It’s not great but I’d say average quality for the genre? I will say that it at least held my attention. Some of these movies the pacing and/or atmosphere is so bad that I often start writing up my thoughts about it during the movie because it’s just not holding my attention. This one, almost nothing actually happens but I was engaged enough to wait until it was over to open up the laptop and type about it. On the other hand, it was overused the dramatic scary music. Almost every time I was so startled by the sudden loud scary music that I honestly missed seeing the brief supernatural event on the screen that it was indicating.