There was a time, way back in 1999, that 21 year old me though that 'The Blair Witch Project' was the most amazing and innovative thing he had ever seen. The use of the camera as a character, this illusion of reality, drew me into the story in a way that few films had for a long time.
Flash forward to 2014 and 35 year old me is pretty much fed up to his back teeth with the 'found footage' genre. As much as I still love 'The Blair Witch Project' it seemed to open the flood gates for a never ending stream of pale imitations.
This sub genre has become the go to style for low budget filmmakers eager to make it big. I can see the appeal. If you have a good idea then it offers a low cost way to get a film made. The problem is an awful lot of the films that get made in this style are not good ideas, they are not even original ideas.
Do I think the sub genre has had its day though? In all honesty I can say no, I don't think the found footage genre will never have it's day. Every time I find myself getting fed up of the style another groundbreaking film comes along. Take the wonderful, Spanish, Zombie movie 'Rec'. When I first this film I had not only grown weary of found footage, but also the zombie genre. It came in the midst of the slew of films that followed the likes of '28 Days Later' and the 'Dawn of the Dead' remake. If you had asked me at that point what I would think of a found footage zombie movie, I would have told you it was the worst idea ever, that someone was milking the two most obvious sub genres of horror for all they were worth. However, 'Rec' did not milk either genre, in my opinion it reinvigorated both.
Then came 'Paranormal Activity', perhaps the first horror film since 'Blair Witch' to live up the hype that surrounded it. Prior to this film haunted house tales had become considered a little old fashioned, but the found footage make over gave the ghost story a much needed new lease of life. I am sure that 'Paranormal Activity' is in no small way responsible for the re emergence of the haunted house story in popular cinema.
Recently I have been watching a lot of low budget, independent horror movies. I have been growing increasingly unimpressed with the way the found footage genre is saturating the market, to the point where I automatically give a film more praise just for being an actual film, no matter how bad it may be. However, a few weeks ago I saw the best indie horror movie I have seen for a long time, a British film called 'The Borderlands'. Guess what? It's a found footage movie, about a Vatican team investigating a possible miracle in the English countryside, only to discover something much more ancient and evil.
The thing that we tend to forget is that found footage did not start in 1999, yes 'The Blair Witch Project' brought it up to date, but it was used to a degree in 'Cannibal Holocaust'. Really though it is the oldest trick in the horror genres repertoire.
Many scholars consider 'The Castle of Otranto' by Horace Walpole to be the first ever horror novel. Written in 1764 this dark, proto gothic tale of madness, murder and spirits presented itself on the first page as a manuscript found in the bowels of a castle. It purported itself to be a true account of events.
Following on from this was 'Frankenstein' by Mary Shelley, this most famous of novels is told as a tale being recounted as a form of confession. 'Dracula' by Bram Stoker is a novel that relays it's tale to the reader in the form of a series of diary entries, letters and reports. In a very real sense the found footage sub genre is the cinematic equivalent of this literary form, and if it was good enough for Stoker, Shelley and Walpole, who am I too argue?
