Review of Project Almanac (2015) by Tyler R — 02 Feb 2015

Found footage as of late has pretty much been left to Z-Grade horror flicks, which is a shame since there are bright spots in the genre, such as Cloverfield and Chronicle. The medium has just been done to death so poorly lately that it gets a bad stigma.

Luckily, there is a saving grace every once in a blue moon, and Project Almanac is here to prove that you don't have to constantly record activities of the paranormal type to use found footage. The film presents a group of high schoolers who stumble upon blueprints for a time traveling device, and set out to build with not so favorable consequences.

Time travel is tricky because you can get lost in your own rules for it. Most time travels films as of late have mostly stuck to the rule: Whatever you do when you go back already happened, and time hasn't caught up to the point when you went back.

Project Almanac throws that away and says: Whatever you do when you go back will have severe consequences. So, what we're given is the usual teen antics of having a good time, partying, and getting rich.

...Until it all hits the fan. The film grounds the machine itself in believable science, and you believe it can actually be built, which is the point of found footage: Believability. Yes, it is just a film, and suspension of disbelief is still required, but the machine itself and the time travel rules are pretty sound.

On the acting front, our group of relative unknowns (although you'll probably recognize a couple faces) do a pretty solid job of selling their average teenage life that gets flipped by time travel.

On the effects side, both the visual and the practical effects hold up nicely, which isn't easy to do in found footage. The only issue I had was the bit of a slow start, but it immediately makes up for it with a kinetic, "can't stop, won't stop" attitude.

Overall, Project Almanac is easily one of the better found footage films in recent memory.