Average found footage movie but nothing more

shadowfax73

When a found footage is done well - decent story, good atmosphere and actors who can improvise, you get a movie that has a greater impact than a scripted movie as it is easy to forget your watching a performance and it's normally a given that most if not all of the characters wind up dead normally with no heroics to make you yawn - horror films should be all about story and acting, not grandstanding. The Blair Witch Project, Grave Encounters, Hell House LLC are all movies that deliver and leave a lasting (good) impression.

The Phoenix Tapes '97 is a very low budget FF film but is not terrible. It is however limited by its budget so there's lots of shooting after dark with an old video camera and black and white footage. That in itself is not a problem but much of the film has the guys running through the woods in a panic and goes on far too long. Stop for a bit, hear a noise, panic, run. stop for a bit, hear a noise........etc. It get a little old. We see the odd half glimpsed shots of little green men but it's never clear how they are tracking or kidnapping the guys - all we see is someone being dragged off screaming but no idea what is doing the dragging.

The above is merely to highlight the limitations of the film, not rip it for not being The Blair Witch Project. What I did have a major problem with is the finding of the camera videos hidden in a wall behind a missing person's bed at the start of the film. I thought he was one of the four guys who went missing but then who put the tapes in there and how were they found? Some of the offhand comments by the father seemed to indicate that he was one of the missing guys and then, later, that he wasn't part of that group. The last we see is the fallen camera in the woods recording the light of the spacecraft taking off. Who found the camera? How was the camera found? Why were the tapes hidden in the wall? That was the massive elephant in the room for me. Most of the film made some kind of sense but the mystery of the tapes? Pass.

score 5/10

shadowfax73 23 March 2020

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw5573076/