Things Unknown

A hip and jocular road allegory turns into a provocative Sci-Fi encounter on an arid plain between Mother Earth and the great space above, in Steve Altman's latest film, "Unknown Project."

A trio of videophiles are on their way back from documenting the Burning Man celebration, in their RV supped up with laptops and 5 cameras running inside 24/7, when they stop for the night. They are brimming with the juice of youth who are wired for their time. We learn just enough about each one so that we can play that great game of "who is the strongest character," and "who do we dislike most intensely." Characterization aside, ultimately it is the silence in this work that commands our attention. Silence that is cold and eerie, and which is nearly photogenic, and used to great effect by Director Altman, who has a command for depicting quiet dread.

The "found footage" genre has a new and welcomed discovery, "Unknown Project."

Well made movie with some nice ideas spread though-out. Several times I had "oh cool, new thing" moments and found myself genuinely surprised once or twice. Cast was great and quite likeable for the most part (rare for found footage) and I actually cared about what was happening to them though I did wish the PBR Neil was drinking had got him to chill bit. The guy was pretty full on for the first two acts.

The whole thing has a pleasant disorientating feel to it that really helped with the mood and as with most good found footage, you find yourself straining to see more but are still left satisfied with what you do see.

Mining Tubi for good found footage movies can be a torturous task sometimes but this one, this one is back on the list for a rewatch.

Stumbled upon this and disappointed I did. This feels like an amateur movie or a college project. It would be fine for that I guess ? But a full feature length film? What's going on here? Money laundering? A tax write off ? And these high reviews are either bots, people who worked on the film or people who normally watch ugly paint dry for entertainment and give that an 8/10.

Acting was pretty poor even though you could tell they were trying. Story was unoriginal and all over the place. I lost interest countless times forcing myself to watch expecting something cool to happen. It never really does. Some of the decisions and things they say does not even really make sense. They have an odd ufo/uap military vs alien debate amongst the two men throughout the entire movie, which is pointless and beyond stupid. They both sound like an 11 year old know it all kid spewing all this trash they read on Wikipedia back to you. A weird romance thrid wheel thing is also going on, like anyone cares about these 40 year old dirt vloggers? Not even to mention in-depth the absolutely horrendous CGI and effects. Again, like a school project.

This 3 stars for a found footage movie and even lower competing outside of it's genre. Maybe if a lot more time or a lot more money this could have watchable. But in this state. I would avoid it, even for free. It is that bad. A waste of time. If you paid to watch this. Oh dear I feel very bad for you.

If B list movies are indicative of a alphabetic ranking of movies in terms of overall quality this would be a "Z list movie".

Hate to also add this to the heap but I have to also admit this was the worst movie I have ever seen up to this point. Found footage or not. This is just bad. No camp, minimum fun and cringe throughout. An affront to your eyes and brain.

I found this movie under the title "Things Unknown" on Tubi.

I know everyone wants something different in the horror/SciFi movie world, but all in all this was a pretty decent movie. The mindless banter in the first half just set the atmosphere for the rest of the movie: paranoia, friendly albeit aggressive exchanges, all set up a friendly camaraderie between the characters. I myself enjoyed the "cheap" special effects along with the moving shadows and camera angles. Sometimes you don't need to see EVERYTHING in 3D. Often it's the shadows and angles that spook you the most.

A fun watch! Go for it!

If you visit the IMDb link for Unknown Project, you'll get a more complete cast list. I don't know what Things Unknown has a 2015 release date while the other is 2013.

It's a pretty good found footage film about three web personalities who go on goofy trips (following a man who visited every pancake house in the US). This time out, they're at Burning Man and afterward take a little detour from their next destination to a desert location where one of the web people camped as a child. Sure enough, they see and experience some pretty strange and horrifying things. The formula is very familiar, but the characters are very likable and the effects very good. Also the sound design. I rented it for $2 on Amazon (twice, because I forgot to finish it the first time before the 48 hours ran out, and I'm glad I finished it.