Horror in the High Desert

It's the easiest way to make a micro-budget film, do a faux documentary that ends with found footage. You can use a lot of photos instead of actually filming anything, have random location shots where nothing is happening, and you never have to stage scenes with actors, just have people sit and be a talking head. And this one starts off seeming to get everything right. The faux actors are believable, the disappearance at the heart of the plot starts getting mysterious, and then after only about twenty minutes it starts sliding progressively downhill. It don't help when you have all these characters (including an investigative journalist who apparently doesn't know how to investigate anything) talking about how super-intelligent and together the missing character is and when we finally see video of him he talks and acts like he just got out of his "special" class for those of, shall we say, far less than average intelligence. Then we spend the next half hour going nowhere with subplots suddenly abandoned or forgotten about and the mystery becomes rather obvious, and then we conclude with ten minutes of "found footage" which is so poorly shot, directed, and overall underwhelming it kinda makes you angry. Shoulda turned it off when the talking heads kept telling how dramatic one of the missing characters last videos was, and then they just say "that video got accidentally erased"; which I took to mean the actors performance was so horrible they couldn't even use a clip of it. And the climactic found footage is literally as bad as you can get. Unless you get scared staring at the same bush under infrared light. One bush. That's pretty much it. From a solid 8/10 in the first few minutes all the way down to 3/10 says it all.

In a way I could understand the lower ratings this movie/mockumentary gets, that is if you were informed about this being fiction before you started watching it. My wife and I on the other hand thought we were watching a documentary about a mysterious disappearance in Nevada. Until the last fifteen minutes we had no clue at all, so credits to the actors for that. They did a really good job playing the interviewees, it looked very sincere. After that it became obvious this wasn't a true story, but still we had our fun believing it, and there was a good mysterious vibe to it. My wife is from Reno, Nevada so her knowing most of those places gave it a little punch as well. It's only after seeing the end credits that we were 100% sure it was all made up. So for that I score this movie way higher than the rest of the reviewers as we were both entertained and sucked into the story immediately. If you had to recommend this movie to a friend or so I suggest you tell them it's a documentary, it will for sure have a better success. I'm glad we thought it was, the experience was just way better like this.

I understand that Found Footage movies are typically about building up to the big ending, and that's fine, but I do prefer it when the meat of the film has a little more going on that just interviewing 5 or so people and chopping between them intermittently. It's only 82 minutes long the film luckily, but the first 67 minutes are basically just this. It can test your patience a little. The final 15 minutes though was a very well done sequence for the most part.

When we finally get to the action 'Horror in the high Desert' does have something to offer. The camera angles, the noise (what was that noise?) and the suspenseful timing were all very well done. The only thing that it forgot is that it's what you don't see that is always scarier than what you do. We saw too much and it ruined it a little for me. That's being a little bit nit-picky though.

If you've got some patience then this one could be for you. It seems to be setting itself up for a sequel too, so look out for that if you enjoy it. 7/10.

If only there was more footage of Gary, rather than interview after interview whose mission is to delay the inevitable, this movie would be better. But is watchable enough and the final 20 minutes are actually creepy and made with plenty of suspenseful talent.

This is one of the most disturbingly effective found footage movies I have ever seen. And I have seen my fair share. Why this has such a low rating I have no idea. The acting is convincing, the storyline is enthralling, I have ADHD and never once checked to see how long I was into this film. I'm a seasoned horror movie buff and this is the first time I have been a bit scared especially at the end. Kudos to the director and everyone involved in this film. And no, I was not one of them. I will definitely be checking out more by this director. As I understand there is a part two and three but I'm not sure if it's the same director.