Review of Exists (2014) by Brett B — 23 Oct 2014

The second found footage bigfoot film of the latter half of 2014, EXISTS is an above average entry in the "bigfoot horror" subgenre, though it's also flawed enough to make the whole package a marginal mixed bag.

What's good about the movie is very good: it wastes no time with a protracted setup, instead choosing to launch right into the strange goings on, and it's very tightly paced. There are some great moments of things just barely in (or out of) the frame, and overall the filmmakers do a very neat (and creepy) job of showing us just the right amount of the creature in question without really showing us everything; there are several sequences built around the idea of things lurking amongst the dense foliage, and they're very effective.

Less effective are the characters, who - at least for the first half of the movie - are the kind of thoroughly unlikable, irritating assholes we seem to be unable to escape from in horror cinema; things do settle down, and eventually some of the characters begin to grow more sympathetic (based almost purely on the ordeal they go through), but they all start from a place of not being terribly worth caring about.

The film's ending may also be a point of contention for some, as it resolves in a fairly unusual way, but I'm of two minds about it: on one hand, I appreciate that they don't go for the stereotypical found footage ending, but on the other hand, the climax doesn't quite have enough juice to land with the impact it seems to strive for.

All told, EXISTS is certainly worth a watch, and I think it serves as an interesting companion piece to this year's earlier (and superior) WILLOW CREEK, as both approach the same subject matter from from wildly different tonal and aesthetic approaches, despite both being set in the woods and utilizing the found footage gimmick.