A film within a film, within another film – Found Footage 3D sets itself apart in the genre of Horror at the 23rd Annual Austin Film Festival.
The film wrapped up AFF’s Saturday night Oct. 15 at its screening at the Alamo Drafthouse Village.
The film drew in a large audience filling the theater. Horror fans of cult classics such as “The Blair Witch Project” and “Paranormal Activity” are in for a treat.
Found Footage 3D revolves around the making of ‘Spectre of Death,’ a low-budget found footage film also known as ‘the first 3D found-footage horror film.’
Audience members are taken on a personal journey as they follow the behind-the-scenes of the cast and crew to a ‘haunted’ cabin in Texas.
The film pokes fun at the found footage genre of horror. Taking itself lightly in the first half of the film, the movie doesn’t hide the stereotypical themes of found footage films.
Instead, they exploit the stereotype themes.
Found Footage 3D knew to not take itself too seriously. They tease at the hand-held shots, the cheap scares, plot holes and the predictability of found footage films.
Director Steven DeGennaro discussed his inspiration for the film during a Q&A after the film.
“I just think of movies like “Scream”,” DeGennaro said. “Those movies were a pave way for the slasher genre in horror. The idea was to make fun of the crappy ones but still pay homage to the good ones.”
The uniqueness of Found Footage 3D is what set this horror film apart from the mainstream horror films being created today. In both script writing and editing.
Cinematography and acting performance stood strong for this film.
Lead Amy (Alena Von Stroheim) was the designated possessed villain in the film. Playing the lead role in ‘Spectre of Death’ in the film.
Stroheim’s performance and relationship with other characters is what horror movies today lack: character development.
Stroheim’s character allows for empathy and a love to hate or hate to love attitude.
A spectre or aura is what possess Amy and haunts the characters throughout the film. The CGI lacked and the spectre looked more like an amature smoke feature. However, make-up visual effects saved Found Footage 3D from it looking like every other low-budget horror.
Characters face their fate at the end of the movie, once the ‘Spectre’ gruesomely slaughters each character one by one. The manslaughter scene was ‘close your eyes’ worthy.
DeGennaro ends the film with a split screen point of view from Amy and the last survivor of the crew.
This tactic kept audience members on the edge of their seats.
DeGennaro said the idea of a split screen was to overlap two stories happening at the same place and same time.
“I guess if there was any inspiration for it, it was the music video for closing time,” DeGennaro said. “You kind of have this thing where two people are trying to find each other this whole time and they pass through the same place the whole time.”
Found Footage 3D is exactly what the horror niche of genre needs and has been calling for.