In 2013, the movie "To Jennifer' was released which billed itself as the first movie shot entirely on the iphone (interestingly, only 2 weeks later another found footage movie HOOKED UP (2013) (which I found quite entertaining but is not to everyone's taste) was released which also claimed to be shot entirely on an iphone). This was followed in 2016 by 2 JENNIFER, 2017 by this movie and finally 2018 FOR JENNIFER (notice the puns).
I just binge watched all four movies, and would like to briefly review these here. The bottom line is that unless you are a hardcore found footage horror movie fan, the only one worth watching is FROM JENNIFER, which can be treated as a stand-alone movie.
TO JENNIFER is a kind of road trip movie in which the main character wants to assemble footage for a film to give to his girlfriend whom he suspects has cheated on him. He is joined by his giggling cousin who has an unerring penchant for making the worst decisions in a given situation, and another friend who personifies every negative personality trait associated with Frat Bros. What sinks the film are three really unlikable main characters and plot twists which can be predicted way ahead of time. This movie is light on horror and gore and more a psychological account of somebody already barely holding on to reality completely descending into the dark side of madness. I rated this as a 5/10.
2 JENNIFER goes meta in that it treats the event of the first movie as fiction which inspires events in the real world. The main character in this movie is creepier than the main guy of the first movie and his sidekick, a clueless but well-meaning friend serves as a good foil, reminding one of a similar dynamic in the movie CREEP (2014), where it is however depicted much more effectively. Like the first movie, this film takes its time before it gets to the horror, but once it arrives, it is way gorier than the first film. In fact, whereas one of the weaknesses of the first film IMO is that it does not delve enough into horror, the problem in 2 is that it delves into too much too quickly after holding back for for a while. One loses interest and stops caring, even if the director and one of the main actors of the first movie show up as fictionalized versions of themselves. I also rated this as a 5/10.
FROM JENNIFER stays at the meta level with respect to the first movie, but switches it up in that the protagonist is now a woman called Jennifer who repeatedly insists not to call her Jenny because that is the name for a female donkey. Whereas the first two movie had some black humor, they were not really funny, but FROM JENNIFER has several genuinely funny laugh out-loud scenes. But even dramatically it holds interest on the basis of the relationship between Jennifer and her devoted bumbling giant Butch, who is just about the most hilariously inept help one could not wish for. Rounding out the main characters is a bubbly blonde who perfectly personifies the vapidity and self-centeredness of influencer culture. While the first two movies might have arguably carried some kind of message relating social media to social harm, it comes across as muddled and unclear. Not so in the third movie: the social critique is razor-sharp, as illustrated by the fact that its protagonist wants the film she makes to be the first member of a novel movie subgenre, namely a "revenge porn revenge movie". Keeping this in mind, the movie ends on a brilliantly ironic note. I rated this 7/10 which in my rating system means that I consider it a good movie.
The last movie in this quadrilogy, FOR JENNIFER, is unfortunately also the weakest. It begins chaotically, and the main characters fail to convince. It is set in a universe in which the first movie is fiction and the second and third movies are real. There is a sort of reunion of the surviving cast members of the previous films, culminating in a gory climax, but there is little logic or sense to it, other than that it seems to attempt to poke fun at horror tropes and fans of horror movies. I think the general concept was not bad, but it was quite poorly executed. I rated this 4/10.
So, again, if you are an avid fan of found footage movies, you might enjoy all four, but if not, then the only one which I think comes under consideration is FROM JENNIFER, especially if you like horror comedies.
