The Goetia Diaries

This found footage horror movie was fantastic! I wasn't really paying attention to what I was doing while I was watching but noticed I was saying *something* out loud with the main character and OOPS!! I got myself all on edge and caught myself looking over my shoulder a couple of times just to be sure and I can't even remember EVER doing that before. It just creeped me out. I think this was well thought out and well made and probably in my top 25 for found footage horror films. Definitely one of the best horror films, in general, I've seen lately. You'd be missing out not to watch it, especially if you like found footage horror like Blair Witch.

The filmmakers went with the found footage approach on this story. It's a story that has been done before, both as found footage and as not. This story was not written well for the genre. The big questions of "why are they filming this" and "how did this get filmed" are really unanswered throughout the movie.

I did like the lead actor, but the supporting cast was not as strong. Again, I think its mostly the writing. The supporting characters had little to no depth. The only supporting cast member I really enjoyed was Zimmer, the video friend. I thought he had some substance and the actor did a really good job with him.

The reveal and the end are a huge letdown. You see it coming a mile away and there is no scary edge or quality to it.

THE GOETIA DIARIES is a found footage movie structured as a series of regular vlogs. The protagonist wants to learn how to summon demons in order to be clearer about his goals. I must admit that I can't quite follow this reasoning, but whatever. He documents his progress on his vlog, and as time goes by, he becomes increasingly entangled with dark forces beyond his control.

As a movie, this is pretty bad. The ending is essentially given away right at the beginning, thus deflating any tension. The cinematography is amateurish, and the acting of many of the players is not great. One notable exception is Lawyer B. Douglas II, who appears to be as colorful a character in real life as in the movie, but if true, it means he was not acting, either. The movie ends on an anticlimactic note despite a twist at the end.

I would have rated this film lower, but it turns out it does stand out positively in one respect: for someone who knows very little about the occult (like me) it is quite educational! Now, I don't believe in any of this stuff, but as a psychological/anthropological phenomenon, it is interesting to me.

When a movie presents some kind of myth, I usually go on the net to check to what extent it is based on real myths (ha, a new oxymoron). The regular vlogs in this film do provide quite a bit of information on the lesser key of Solomon, as best as I can tell, it seems to check out.

Alas, this documentary masquerading as a movie masquerading as a vlog still has to be evaluated as a movie, especially since the film takes the occult seriously. And as a film, this did unfortunately not work.

There is absolutely nothing in this movie worth of your time. The main character is horribly written and the actor has no idea what he's doing. I swear to god, sometimes I felt that he was reading the script. The ONLY good (ish) actor is the dude in the webcam. The dialogues in the movie are terrible, it feels like a cheap soap opera where people need to wait the others finish talking to start talking themselves. The story leave things behind (like seeing things because of the video he watches), and it has A LOT of "telling", and not "showing". The fortmat should be interesting, but there are vlogs that don't make any sense to be posted. Somewhere along the movie the main character forgets the name of his channel, and it is very embarassing because we see the title card "East to West" and the dude keeps calling it "East meets West".

The ending is pretty pathetic, like everything else in the movie.

There is a 8 stars review here, but it must be the crew of the movie.

One of the worst FF I've ever seen...and it had everything to be interesting...