Friday, November 18, 2011

Atrocious



(2010) ***

While on holiday siblings and amateur paranormal enthusiasts Christian and July Quintanilla decide to investigate the “Legend of the girl in the Garraf woods”, a large overgrown maze of a garden where a young girl once disappeared that just so happens to abut the Quintanilla’s remote countryside home. Christian and July both record everything that they do with the hope of creating a television special. On the 5th day, however, they are found dead under mysterious circumstances. Atrocious presents the last 5 days of their lives.



Atrocious is another solid found footage indie film. Although these films are increasingly following a very basic formula (i.e. people are found dead and their final days are documented on film or video), it’s an effective formula that I’m currently digging, a lot. I went through a similar phase with J-horror up until recently. Atrocious is a tight, 75-minute story that rarely drags, although there were a few moments that seemed to go on a smidge too long. The Spanish setting (Sitges) is perfect and the garden labyrinth puts The Shining maze to shame.

3 comments:

Johnny Sweatpants said...

Good lord, another found footage haunting movie? At this point I need to see four stars before I even consider taking the plunge. I will definintely check out The Tunnel though!

Catfreeek said...

Yet another film I have never heard of, you really dug deep this year. It took me a minute to realize that was a knife in that last pic, at first I thought it was a crab leg.

Octopunk said...

I thought it was a doll's arm!

It seems these ffooties are the new reality show -- except I don't automatically hate them. Not as cheap to write, of course, but probably way cheaper to produce than regular cinema.

I probably would have missed it if this hadn't been parked atop the blog all weekend, but Atrocious is kind of a silly title for a horror movie. You don't think so at first, but unlike, say, Insidious, which implies menace and suspence, "Atrocious" is all up in your face. Why not call it "Horrible!"

Malevolent

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