Parched

This flick is really well done and scared the living hell out of me. I loved the simple story and the cast was really likable. For this style of film, I really like what they did with it, exploiting the setting in a funky way. Really a fun ride with a cool twist!

This is my 63rd found footage film. A glutton for punishment, I keep sifting the mountain of no-budget found films for the few gems it contains. In the process, I have seen a lot of really, really bad movies. This one is easily the worst - although Secreto Matusita, Altar, and Classroom 6 are close runners-up.

There is nothing about this "movie" that is worth your time, even if you like found footage. The acting is terrible. Its not even good enough to be amusing, as in bad-in-a-good-way. The "story" is non-existent. The footage is padded with tons of "nature" scenes, which, in this case amounts to nothing other than leaves and a spider at one point. The "twist" is a joke.

The only good thing I can think of with regards to this utterly amateur failure of a film is that it does highlight the qualities that _good_ found footage movies have. Its easy to criticize found footage for having no "script" or having "shaky" camera work. Its easy to criticize these movies for their attempts at "realistic" reactions from the "actors." But if you watch Parched and then watch any number of other found footage films, you will find that there is in fact a baseline for good vs bad. It might not be enough to convince someone who simply doesn't like the medium that found footage can be viable, but it can at least demonstrate the merits of effort - which is lacking here in every conceivable way.

There's something weirdly voyeuristic in this low/no budget spectacle of frantic acting, blood curdling screams and primal survival instincts. There's a creepy feel to the whole thing, that keeps building and building and eventually erupts into an explosion of shadowy scares and flat-out BIZARRE murders. There seems to be a theme here about neglected ecological issues and pollution of the planet, which kind of gets lost in the mix of people running around and losing their minds. I liked the feel of it though; odd and somewhat sad in the end.

I can't hate this kind of film. It's not in any way painfully stupid or offensive to the senses. The problem with it is that it's just bad. It's like a group of people trying to paint a mural when none of them have any experience painting.

No one here was ready to do what they had to do here. The acting was not even on a level of being "bad" so much as it is plainly obvious that these kids involved have never done it before. The camerawork gets a pass as it's supposed to look like school project done on a single handheld camera. Lots of the effects such as people swinging a bat or an axe are not properly shot or cut, and you end up with a scene such as someone swinging at axe, and very clearly aiming away to avoid hitting the actor just before the camera turns away.

Everyone here seems to be trying their best, but they just can't. Nothing comes across as genuine or authentic. The way they deliver lines gives me flashbacks of Drama I classes with students delivering their first live performance. The only actor who came across as truly awful and not just inexperienced was the man playing Reginald, who seemed to be wrestling with a mouthful of lines written by someone who's never seen or heard a southerner outside of a 1930s cartoon.

It would be admirable as a friends project or a drama school assignment, but this is not a finished film fit for public consumption.

I have to applaud the people behind this film; they seemed to make something out of nothing. It's a wild and weird ride from start to finish, an art-house / tongue-in-cheek slasher mashup that satisfies all the usual horror tropes, but goes beyond with some interesting philosophy underlaid. The dialogue is a bit stilted in places, but the actors really felt like they were the characters, with their true misery being glanced at in particular parts, and their terror just visible beneath the surface of trying to stay cool. It's far from a perfect film, but it has a uniqueness to it, even with a fairly familiar premise.

Cool ending too.