The Horror Show
They're Watching
by Jay Lender and Micah Wright
Good or bad, a horror movie should leave you feeling something; this is one of my mantras. I strongly believe that a horror movie should leave you with a reaction. It could be disgust, happiness, fear, or even melancholia. If you see a bad horror flick you usually still feel something. With me, it's mostly anger, but They're Watching left me feeling conflicted.
This is a very quirky found footage movie about an American TV crew doing an international home renovation show. They return to Moldova to see how Becky, an American pottery artist, is doing in her renovated cottage in the woods on the outskirts of the village. What they find is a whole lot of folklore and superstition. The film crew accidentally anger the local villagers and it snowballs into a nightmare. Nothing is more skin-crawlingly creepy as a bunch of Eastern European villagers staring blankly at you, from the edge of the woods, holding sharp farming equipment. I can't really tell you too much of the plot because it has one of those ol' twist endings and I would hate to ruin it for someone.
This is pretty much a slow burn movie, like most found footage movies are. It takes up almost half of its run time on back story. Back story on the handsome camera dude that was in Afghanistan. Backstory on the boss's pretty blonde niece who went to film school and is new to the show. Backstory on the legend of the witch that was burned at the stake. The only one of the main characters that doesn't get a backstory is the goofy stoner stereotype, and it's a shame, he was entertaining. Honestly, all the characters were some sort of stereotype. The bitchy boss, the smarmy foreign guy, the creepy old “you're doomed” Moldovan woman. It was full of them, and like the goofy stoner guy, they were all pretty entertaining.
The beautifully executed practical effects before the big reveal are amazing. But then it turns into a more cartoon or video game-like CGI explosion of kills. This isn't really surprising when you realize the director/writers worked on SpongeBob SquarePants and Call of Duty before making this. This is when I became conflicted. Before the twist we got some intriguing folklore that created an interesting mystery. After, it turned into a weirdly animated light show with exploding bodies. I'm all for exploding bodies, but not when they look like they’re some kind of bad video game graphics.
I really can't say They're Watching was great movie. When I was discussing it with a friend he said “It was a bad movie… that bad movie you watched had charm.” I don't know if it was a bad movie with charm; I think it was an OK movie with charm and it's that charm that makes it watchable.
Robin Thompson, HMS
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