God Save Us From Go Pro

 

 (imdb)

HARDCORE HENRY-2015-This dizzy violent sci-fi chase film is like a role playing video game. The whole story is the POV of some hybrid android thing called Henry trying to rescue his wife from an over-acting psycho in Moscow. 

It was shot with a Go-Pro using anything goes computer effects. Tim Roth plays Henry's father. The director, Ilya Naishuller threatens a sequel.

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Dark Bogart

 

 imdb)

DARK PASSAGE-1947-Escape convict Vincent Parry (Humphrey Bogart) is helped by painter Irene Janson (Lauren Bacall). It's all a mystery to him. She says she thinks he got a raw deal at his trial. Parry plans to have plastic surgery. He discovers that a woman (Anges Moorehead) who testified against him knows Irene and also a guy named Bob (Bruce Bennett). There are a few twists and turns and a nightmare sequence, but the strange part is the Parry character. The first part is shown from a POV shot, then he's seen with bandages. Finally, Bogart is seen and everything is revealed. Wonder how many name stars would have accepted this kind of role? 

Different type of film noir from co-writer- director Delmar Daves who made the equally mysterious THE RED HOUSE with Edward G. Robinson the same year. Co-writer David Goodis wrote the novel the film is based on. Years later when the ABC series “The Fugitive” debuted, Goodis sued the production company saying the TV show was based on his novel “Dark Passage”. The suit dragged on long after Goodis' death in 1967 and was finally settled in 1972. French new wave director Francois Truffaut based his film SHOOT THE PIANO PLAYER on the Goodis novel “Down There”.

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Happy New Year!

AREA 407-Another BLAIR WITCH PROJECT inspired movie has the story of some plane crash survivors told through the POV camera of one of the young passengers. The bloodied and battered survivors are menaced by some kind of dinosaur. After a small group find a cabin to hide in, a car pulls up and asks some questions but then drives away. After much terror and an adventure in a car only two sisters remain but they are killed by a driver who picks them up. It's never explained but it's obvious it's some kind of experimental base created by our "evil" government. There's also a government warning leader at the start.

Great finale scene!

I liked this better than CLOVERFIELD! It had two directors.  A Part 2 was recently made...

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Found Monster Footage

CLOVERFIELD-2008-A monster attacks New York. A group of friends at a farewell party try to survive. The story is told through the eye of a hand held camera one of them is using. The monster is huge and drops smaller creepy alien types with big teeth. Although it's a chaotic mess, the director Matt Reeves does a good job of getting the whole story across. The group dwindles as they try to stay alive and find their friends but it seems to me if they had made their way to The 59th Bridge they could gave escaped to Queens! The jiggly POV shots are ok but it doesn't really look like some amateur film. And can anyone explain why the camera battery lasted so long? Director Reeves previously directed episodes of the TV show FELICITY and later made LET ME IN. At the time of this writing he was working on a Planet of The Apes sequel. JJ Abrams was one of the producers. (and like his TV series LOST, where the monster came from or what happens to it and the world are left unexplained) The big surprise for me was it was only 85 minutes!

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PS: I was just informed that a huge video campaign (including fictional websites like in LOST) were used before and during CLOVERFIELD's release. Using hints from that there are ways to piece together where the monster came from. Apparently I'm the only person who didn't know about this!