Project MKHEXE

This was a film that I got the chance to check out via screener thanks to Alex from Simply Legendary Publicity. This is a film that is coming to Screambox, which is a streaming service that I subscribe to and periodically use to watch different things they offer. What caught my attention here is that this falls into the found footage filming style. There was limited information available which intrigued me even more. This being a 2025 horror film was another perk in its favor. I've also now given it a second watch to see where I sat with it for my end of year list.

Synopsis: an aspiring filmmaker returns home after his younger brother's suicide, only to discover his brother's obsession with a malevolent conspiracy theory that threatens to destroy reality.

This starts off with a home video for a young boy's birthday party. There is voice-over narration by our lead character, Tim (Ignacyo Matynia), talking about his younger brother, Sean (Will Jandro). He passed away and the reasoning for his death was ruled suicide. Tim goes about making this documentary to explore what drove his brother to do what he did. Sean just completed his freshman year of college. He was always a happy guy. That was until about 100 days before his death.

Sean returned home for the summer to relax and hang out with his friends. He ended up spending more time at home with his parents, played by Jennifer Lynn O'Hara and Dwayne Tarver. Sean believed he stumbled upon proof of a secret government project to do mind control. It is in the vein of Project MKULTRA. This one was Project MKHEXE.

The information out there is limited. It is to the point where Tim wonders if his brother was connecting things that weren't related as he descended into madness. Tim seeks out Nicole (Jordan Knapp) who was a friend to his brother. She was spending time with him during the dark days leading to his death. She encourages Tim to do the documentary. What they find will test their limits of belief, border into the supernatural and make them wonder if they're also going crazy. It also strains relationships around them.

That is where I'll leave my recap and introduction to the characters. Where I'll start is by saying that this is a difficult one to write about. At the time of initially writing this review, I had to piece information together. There wasn't an Internet Movie Database or Letterboxd page. I took info from the press release and the Amazon Prime page. I'll give credit for being in this age of the internet, keeping as much of this secret as they can.

Now that I've set this up, let me tell you why I like being cryptic like they are. It is difficult to preserve realism for a movie like this. It feels in the vein of The Blair Witch Project where I don't recall there being opening credits. The screener version didn't have ending credits, but provides a QR code which leads to their website that gives more information. If memory serves, I had another screener for a found footage film like this called Murder Death Koreatown. With the internet, social media and a 24 hour news cycle, when you can hide things like they do here, I'm on board for that.

The intriguing title of Project MKHEXE makes sense with Tim's background information and my understanding of its pronunciation. It plays on Cold War-era government secret projects, stemming from Project Paperclip, where both the US and Soviet Union brought over scientists after WWII. MKHEXE appears to be a sister project to MKULTRA, which involved subliminal messaging and mind control broadcast late at night in the Midwest, possibly facilitated by a machine. This resonates with my own childhood memories of late-night, hazy television viewing, a shared experience that enhances the project's impact.

The last bit for the story to go into is that this has vibes of cosmic horror. There are these images that Sean received that are from different places but oddly similar. That feels like something from H. P. Lovecraft's The Call of Cthulhu. There is a name of their 'god' that is referenced. Sticking in that line, we have characters that are driven mad which is a concept that gets used in dealing with entities like this. What I like though is that there could be a logical or a supernatural angle to explain things. It is left up to the viewer to decide what they think. We are also seeing footage but it could be tampered with or seeing what characters are which adds to the mystique.

Filmmaking for this found-footage project, focusing on visuals and character experience, presents unique challenges and opportunities. The "why are they still filming?" question is justified by the characters documenting Sean's descent into madness for a documentary, hoping to avoid the same fate. This format limits staging but allows for interesting practical effects, despite some dated computer graphics. The declining mental state of the characters viewing the footage explains the inconsistencies. The sound design is also noteworthy, with specific sounds triggering events.

All that is left then is the acting performances. I thought that Matynia was good as our lead. What I love is that we see the videos showing Jandro's character crazy. We then seeing Tim follow a similar path as his brother, which is good. I like that Knapp is someone we can't fully trust. Part of that though is that it feels like she's holding information back. We're also following an unreliable narrator so that's another. Other than that, I'd say O'Hara, Tarver and the rest of the cast rounded this out for what was needed.

In conclusion, this is an interesting and well-executed entry into the found footage horror subgenre. Its commitment to realism and the effective use of limited information enhance its initial impact, drawing parallels to classics like The Blair Witch Project. While it may lose some of its mystique on a second viewing, the film successfully blends elements of cosmic horror with a compelling narrative that leaves much to the viewer's interpretation. Strong performances, particularly from Ignacyo Matynia and Will Jandro, contribute to its unsettling atmosphere. Despite minor flaws in CGI, the overall filmmaking, sound design, and the exploration of an unreliable narrative make Project MKHEXE a film worth experiencing, especially for fans of the genre.

My Rating: 6.5 out of 10.

I really wanted to like this movie a lot more. The premise was intriguing, but one that we've seen before in other films, and even episodes of the X-Files. The problem is in the execution.

Under perhaps a more adept screenwriter, director and DP, it could've been suspenseful, frightening, or even scary. Unfortunately, there were too many ideas presented, and too many characters I didn't really - and were never made to - care about. For instance, the Police response when the two leads attempt to present them with evidence of the conspiracy (for lack of better word) was so predictable, I could've written it in my sleep.

The acting was fine. The effects were fine. But in the end, there was just no payoff. Was it an ancient "Akkadian" god behind this, or the governement, or what? And if it was a god, why don't we get to see it (not that we need too as proved by 2022's Glorius)?

It just wasn't enough to make it stand out from so many other similar works.

If you've got nothing better to watch, Project MKHEXE is a perfectly servicable distraction. I just wanted more from it.

There was alot of work put into this. Well thought of and in my opinion nicely executed, I had no feelings of dread, nor did I feel scared or 'jumpy'... but I was sucked into this movie from the start untill the end with feelings of unease and curiosity. This movie went deep. I applaud the efforts put into this, from writing to acting and the visuals/audio.

Some of the worst acting I've ever seen. The story itself is a good concept but it's not as smart as they believe it is. Found footage films can be a lot of fun when done well, even if they're a little predictable, but this is very poorly executed. Again, I cannot stress enough just how bad the acting is, it's almost worth watching just to see how fake these characters are, especially his mother and the "friends", it's difficult to understand how this movie was watched by the filmmakers and still released. Absolutely terrible, it seems more like a highschool film made for a class project by people with no acting training and no filmmaking experience.

I respect their idea here, I really do. I bought in at about the 20 minute mark, but then after 40 more minutes of the same interviews and half built concepts the movie turns into something like a nightmare. Not like a cool nightmare movie, more like a nightmare for the audience to endure.

So many flashing lights, yelling, split screens, confusion, nothing adds up.

I haven't watched a movie in a while where I was annoyed and angry at the end. This is one of those movies. Nothing even makes sense in the last 30 minutes. My headache just got worse and worse and worse. Please for all young filmmakers, if you're doing a found footage movie it needs to be under 1 hour and 30 minutes and it needs a coherent plot something there...I have a migraine now. Great. 2.2/10.