Raccoon Valley

Going into this you must be aware that the guy who wrote and did almost everything on it from tea boy to director only cost a total of $175 and review it as such.

It does not have zombie hordes or explosions and mass CGI but has a haunting atmosphere, rather subtle music and a very different way of attacking a movie making project and this is what it is and should be reviewed as such.

So yes, it is more of a movie project and less of a film but it does well with what little he had in his wallet and shows what can be done with a very little amount of cash and has to be congratulated for the end result. There will not be many who will appreciate it in this day and age of mass CGI and multi million pound blockbusters and if you are expecting this then you probably will not appreciate or enjoy this film, but hey give it a try and think try to appreciate what could be produced with $175 in your pocket.

Less of a movie and more of a proof of concept. The idea is to show you how far $175 can go. I think that's amazing and they should be applauded for what they put together with that, but sadly I don't think it's fair to take that into account when recommending the film. It's an interesting watch, but I would not call it captivating so much as a curiosity.

The narrative is fairly straight forward. As stated in the summary a woman is left behind in a biohazard outbreak and must navigate safety and escape a hostile, spooky environment. There's no dialog. Instead you interpret what's she's feeling via a sort of amorphous soundscape score and her actions.

This is where the movie, at times, fails the viewer. The woman never shows any emotion what-so-ever. It's like she truly doesn't care, but that contradicts her actions as she desperately moves from one situation to the next. Additionally a lot of the things she does are not only unrealistic, but especially not in character for her special circumstance. There's just many examples throughout where she doesn't "act" how someone in her situation would, categorically, for very specific reasons. This unfortunate because it's not budget related. I think if they'd done a little more research, the protagonist could have been portrayed more realistically, to the benefit of the film. Lastly, while I quite enjoyed the soundtrack, there's a few scenes where the tone didn't shift to fit the situation so it ended up being almost bright and bouncy when it should have been heightening the tension.

All that said I never really threw up my hands and walked out. This is a slow burn film and I think it did it well. There's a scene in particular that straight up gave me goosebumps. There's a million ways they could have screwed that one up, but man it felt lifted out of a nightmare. That moment alone elevated this from a 3 to a 5.

I wish I could give this a higher rating considering the budget, but I think for non-cinephiles and anyone not a film school student this will likely be a pass. It's only going to be for folks that enjoy hard work shown in a film rather than the whole picture.

Not a bad movie should have been longer. With more action in it I seen similar movies like this there's is some thing some people probably missed I didn't see it the first time watching it I may wach this again to see if I missed any thing.

This little gem was so perfectly filmed I could have watched it with the sound off, and it would still have had the same effect of the slowly building horror, loneliness and isolation of the main character. She was in a seemingly hopeless situation, yet never displayed hopelessness or despair, despite her fear. Rather, I saw her determination, strength and composure slowly manifest even as her understanding of the situation increased. If you are drawn to stories of horror and survival on a small scale, this movie is for you. I was amazed at the production budget of $175.00. I don't know how that's even possible, but the result was a very satisfying, engrossing and suspenseful story. I'm so glad I ignored the bad reviews, followed my gut and gave it a watch.

I have gone through many low budget horror movies that are high school quality atmosphere and acting. This one is excellent on zero budget.