Population Zero

This is a great movie. If you like mocumentry style films you will love this one.

I went into this movie not knowing a lot about it and I suggest not watching any trailers or reading about the plot.

What I will tell you is that the subject matter is original and it is one of the better mocumentry style files I have seen. I even had to google it afterwards just to be 100% certain it wasn't a real documentary.

The movie itself is not scary but as it wound along and started to reveal itself I became quite creeped out about the fact that the idea behind this movie is real.

Definitely worth a watch if you want something a bit different with an edge of truth.

In 2009, three young men are killed in a remote part of Yellowstone National Park. Dwayne Nelson walks in and confesses. Due to a constitutional loophole, he is acquitted and walks free. Five years later, documentary filmmaker Julian T. Pinder is given the material and decides to investigate.

It's a faux documentary. The premise is interesting although the law case should probably come first. It needs a little more explaining like I'm a complete idiot. The first half is fine although I would be lying if I say that it's entrancing. It has a sad mood and shows a world grinding down. The movie loses me somewhat with the fracking. I don't love its use. I'm more taken with this being an act of random madness or a madman bent on committing the perfect crime. As an idea, this is more compelling than its execution.

I didn't read anything about Population Zero before watching it and to be honest I thought it was a documentary for almost half of the movie before realizing it was a mockumentary. So credits to the actors in the beginning that made it look genuine. Acting is good when it doesn't look like acting. Once it looks like acting you're actually not a good actor, that's paradoxal but that's how it is. At half of the movie it was suddenly obvious there were acting scenes, so not a good job from those actors. But for a mockumentary I have to admit I enjoyed it. It's well made and the story is interesting. Population Zero is low budget but it isn't bad, certainly not for the way it's shot, with handycams, not really the kind of cinematography I normally enjoy.

POPULATION ZERO is a mockumentary or fake documentary the strongest aspect of which is an intelligent plot based on real-life issues.

A man kills three young hikers in Yellowstone National Park, then immediately turns himself in and confesses, but offers no motive. His trial fails because, it turns out, there is a legal loophole in the US constitution which effectively permits crimes to be committed in this area due to the fact that it has population zero. Five years later, a documentarian retraces the murders and the events that led to them, and comes across an unexpected discovery.

While the murders are fictional, the issue with the legal loophole is a real-life legal problem which was discovered by a law professor. Interestingly, a novel had been written years before with substantial similarities to this set-up based on that loophole. It is called "Free Fire", and it concerns an attorney who kills four hikers in the same area in Yellowstone National Park and also immediately turns himself in and confesses, offering no motive.

The author of "Free Fire", CJ Box, has publicly accused this documentary of plagiarism. The accusation could be true, but I believe there is room for doubt. For one thing, despite the nearly identical premise, there are some differences in each case between the killer, his victims, his pursuer and, most importantly, his motives. For another, after the law professor published his article on the loophole, it is conceivable that multiple people could have independently thought of a similar fictional murder plot that would exploit it. Most importantly, Box himself seems to have admitted that the alleged plagiarism did not extend to verbatim passages from his book.

Unfortunately, people steal ideas from each other all the time. I don't know whether that is the case here, but I decided to give the film-makers the benefit of the doubt.

With that out of the way, I found the plot to be well-constructed, and the connection to fracking, another real-life problem, both completely unanticipated and incorporated in a very natural way. The characterization of the antagonist in this had shades of "John Doe" in SE7EN (1995). There is a reference by the director, who plays himself, to a previous actual documentary he had made on environmental pollution, and I found this mixing of reality and fiction amusing, as it seems to be sort of the converse of the "Bateson's Belfry" hoax by Michael Crichton in THE GREAT TRAIN ROBBERY (1978).

The pace is rather slow, but the plot offers enough twists along the way that it keeps interest. As far as mockumentaries are concerned, I would rate it as one of the best, so fans of the genre may wish to add it to their watchlist, perhaps followed by a reading of "Free Fire".

This film is made documentary style and quite well. It's very slow burn style I liked and the scenes are beautiful. It's the story that can't carry the film. If I want watch TV for an hour, I don't wan't to watch fake documentary. Yes, it has some drama an thrill but it's only purpose seems to be there because it has to.

Wasted an hour for a very short story stretched unnecessarily. Slow burn is OK, but it must deliver. Four stars because it was technically well done.