Missing 411

So, from the moment I found out about the work David Paulides was doing with his books in "The Missing 411" series, my eyes were opened to an extremely bizarre and troubling phenomenon. People have been going missing in clusters around the country with mysterious circumstances and a large percentage are in national parks, and the parks system doesn't keep (or at least release) database information about these people??? This is what I believe is the true focus of this film and all of the books... to warn people of the potential danger that clearly exists but is being downplayed. We're not imagining these people missing... the information Paulides presents in the books and movies is from actual newspaper articles, police reports and witness testimony. so to give this film a bad rating because of completely unrelated situations, opinions, and unsubstantiated claims is to completely miss the point and do a disservice to the true purpose of the movie and books. Sure, we all were hoping for a ton of the thought provoking case profiles in the books to be presented, but that just logically could not happen in a 1.5 to 2 hour long film. If we really care about the people who have gone missing and their families and anyone who will potentially go missing in the future, we need to get over ourselves and help promote this movie so attention will be drawn where attention is severely needed. My heart goes out to the families that have suffered through the unthinkable, and I hope this movie and the other work Paulides is doing will honor them by bringing that much needed attention. I too selfishly wanted more, but maybe positively promoting this film will get me more sequels to satisfy my selfishness (and subsequently bring even more attention to the lost!)

God bless.

1. Yes, I DO recommend people see this documentary! 2. It deserves high marks for attempting what no others ever have before. 3. The camera work is truly stellar. 4. I'm going to be painfully honest about why it really missed it's mark.

In all fairness, it does great justice to the Deorr Kunz case, and it's a good vehicle to fully feel and understand the powerful sense of loss that Jaryd Atadero has had to cope with all these years. What might be the issue here for a lot of people(Me included) is that it tries too hard to emphasize those 2 cases ALONE(especially Deorr's) at the expense of other, extremely important cases that are not only similar, but also as poignant. I believe I understand the 'style' of documentary that Michael and Ben were trying to put together here, but it simply falls a bit flat throughout, and tends to also ramble in places where it should be moving on to other cases rather than backtracking with the same depth and heartfelt emotion. I also do NOT think adding voice-overs from C2C shows brought anything worthwhile of relevance to this project. Going back over and over and returning to a subject that has seemingly been covered already is also distracting and often frustrating to watch. Personally, I believe documentaries that do that tend to lose people's interest quickly because it takes you back rather than moving you progressively forward.

Nonetheless, it's important enough that people should take the time to see it. And I DO hope the next one, assuming there will be one, will hit people in the gut like Paulides' interviews often do. Bullet-point facts back-to-back, less mellow-drama and over-emphasis than we saw here,and a lot more emphasis on the MYSTERY, the boulder fields, the extreme similarities of cases, the possible paranormal aspects(as in the kid who refused to poop for his robot grandma), the international cases, and Mr. David Paulides himself in front of the camera speaking to us directly occasionally.

That would REALLY do it for me...

To date I've listened to all the Coast to Coast radio interviews and as many other interviews with David Paulides as possible. I wanted to see the doc so badly after hearing him answer questions, appear on Youtube, but I was somewhat disappointed.

This book series lends itself more to a whole Missing 411 series on Netflix or Hulu rather than a single doc. There are so many interesting cases, and David has a knack of walking you through the facts without inserting interpretation.

One of the lasting outcomes of his work will be a national database and the accountability of the National Park Service, an organization I fully admire. This doc does not reveal the level of obfuscation that they have put forth, leading to wild speculation.

The mystery of missing people alone is worth watching this but it doesn't do the book series justice. Perhaps no single doc could. So, maybe we'll see a series in the future.

A very well produced movie, the cinematography wonderfully presented and the subject matter gripping. Being a long follower of the missing 411 work, I was excited to see the product of all the research and strange circumstances surrounding individuals who inexplicably vanished. The film introduces the phenomena well and sets up a documentary which you immediately can not turn away from. I looked forward to the interviews shown in the trailer but found these did not make the final cut, a little disappointing considering Paulides and George Knapp have so much to say on the subject. The film pivots around one single case which to be fair is very interesting, if not a little shady. Some would comment a huge amount of suspicion around the case which for me personally left me wanting the film to move on from this and present other cases mentioned in the books those being the main profile that make David's work so compelling: K9 scents, folded clothes, missing shoes, change of weather, the impossibility of locations, boulder fields the list goes on. The film touches on this ever so briefly but I feel nothing presented in this documentary is a classic missing 411 event. However it is a very interesting film and I hope the start of a running set of films which will open up the whole Missing 411 enigma. Well done to everybody involved and continue this fantastic research. A brilliant effort.

Documentary about children who go missing in national parklands. It's intriguing and heartbreaking. For some reason this director seems to believe in every crypto possibility there is. The flick is fashioned to point to an ET or crypto type answer to all of the mysteries surrounding these deaths. So sad but not believable.