Butterfly Kisses

"Butterfly Kisses" adds its own unique (meta) spin on the found footage genre. Definitely if you just go by the call-in radio set-piece, and its special telephone guest. Clever touch. Sure it still follows the standard low-budget sub-genre cliches, but it's how the story is presented is where it sets itself apart. Heavy on mystery with its urban legend style groundwork. A wannabe film-maker stumbles across a box (labelled 'Don't watch') of a student's film project involving research into a local urban legend; Peeping Tom. So he goes about trying to investigate if the disturbing footage is real, while trying to complete their unfinished project as his own work. He gets a seperate documentary crew to follow him around to consolidate his findings and tell his story of getting this done.

While watching I was getting 'Lake Mungo' vibes, as it focused more so on mood and discomfort than all out frights and incidents. It's slow burn, constantly conversational and sort of creeps up on you in a potboiler way. There's a documentary within a documentary within a documentary framework to the story as one film-maker's obsession becomes a domino effect for everyone involved. Meaning there's no real satisfying conclusion to it all. Probably by the end it was more interesting than entertaining.

Yes, it's been done before. However this is clearly a movie for fans of this category, not for people expecting something new. I mean, the trailer makes that obvious so don't watch it without that common sense or you're just looking to complain about a movie.

It's not the best found footage style, but it's still good. I like that the themes challenge what's real and what isn't. Do you believe something so badly you're willing to ignore possible contradictions? If you're an artist, are you telling a story for the sake of educating, inspiring, or forcing the story to go a direction it shouldn't (like Gavin)? I like that the main character was determined to foolishly pass the tapes off as real instead of letting the audience view and enjoy it as whatever they decide it to be...like this film overall! The creator/director isn't attempting to pass it off as real, at least not in the movie credits. Don't know about imdb credits.

If you're a fan of this stuff, it's not bad. Wouldn't say it's a 10, but you'll enjoy it.

Working on a thesis project, a film student attempting to explore the truth behind a local boogeyman falls victim to the terrifying being, forcing a filmmaker to assemble the footage and complete the film for a documentary crew only to wind up going down the same roads of insanity himself.

Overall, this was an interesting and somewhat chilling effort. As with the majority of these kinds of films, the fact that the central premise of the project is based on a creepy concept works nicely. The central core of the local legend, a hooded figure that appears out of a local tunnel after performing a specific ritual and then begins to haunt the individual based on the ritual, is the kind of story that easily fits within a small-town urban legend that would exist. The manner in which this springs out of the film into their world as his obsession to get to the truth about the strange phenomenon he's filming soon grows to incredibly lengths due to the desire to get the adulation for having been proven true through the guise of several familiar and effective jump scenes regarding the figure as it seems to appear in their footage. There's plenty of unnerving and chilling work of the creature throughout here as the concept for its appearance offers several chilling encounters. Likewise, the other exceptionally enjoyable aspect of this one is a truly fascinating look at the concept of found-footage verses the documentary. As the filmmaker attempting the original project rightfully observes, the original footage in the truest context of the word is found-footage yet the documentary he is making clearly isn't so his claims about them being otherwise clearly is false. That this is in turn being covered by a documentary film crew exploring the realization of the original tapes brings the entire concept into a wonderfully meta conception invoking the commonly-known concept of the director letting the audience see only what he wants you too which allows the lines between reality and fantasy to get blurred as he begins to spiral out of control in an effort to get people to believe the truth about his project. This is what drives the final half of the film and is what really holds this one up. This one does have some flaws to it. The majority problem here is the fact that the majority of the documentary is about the arrogant, self-righteous filmmaker who alienates everyone around him, thinks everyone has to bow down to him for what he's found and has to be the authority on the matter at every situation. Whenever he gets any kind of negative feedback or even just general criticism about truly genuine issues here, the first response that it's not seen as a masterpiece results in a crybaby breakdown that's entirely unappealing to sit through and just makes him entirely unlikable. As well, there's also the fact that the film drops off the boogeyman entirely instead by focusing on the guy which drops off the horror elements entirely as these tactics are brought out. These here are what holds this one back overall.

Rated R: Graphic Language and Violence.

I won't go into the details as so many others have already laid out much of it. If you're looking for a horror or thriller, this probably isn't the film for you. It's more of a character profile. It's a film with in a film. The "found footage" would be the typically generic of that genre...film students being hunted/killed by otherworldly force. The more interesting part of the film is the central character. He's a loser and a jerk. He failed as a film student, works a menial job, can't support his family, steals from his own child, is belligerent towards people who can help him and worst of all is using someone else's work in order to make a name for himself. There were annoying bits about not finding any records of the missing/dead players from the "found footage," except for one. Also the ending is annoying. I won't give that away, I will give my opinion on a stronger ending, though. I would have enjoyed the ending had it been an interview with the characters of Feldman and Crane being amazed that a failed and forgotten film project had driven someone to obsession and madness.

A self-aware found-footage film. Now there's a concept I don't think I've seen before. At one point 'Butterfly Kisses' even has a character list all the flaws in the found-footage film concept. It also features the director of 'The Blair Witch Project' Eduardo Sánchez giving his opinion on whether a film was or was not real footage. And strangely enough, it all works and even manages to create a tense horror film in the process.

The concept takes a little while to get used to, but once you start to realise what they're going for and how the format works you are able to settle in and just enjoy the ride. It is admittedly a little clunky in places, but it certainly gets better as the film goes along. Because of the way the story is told it feels like two films in one. You have a mystery and a horror being told concurrently. The horror story is almost certainly the strongest aspect of 'Butterfly Kisses' though.

The film contains one of the best jump-scares I've ever seen in a film. It got me really good, and I'm not got easily. I missed this film back in 2018 when it was released but I'm glad I went back and found it because it was an enjoyable watch. I would recommend people give this one a look.