Tuchergson Truly the worst movie I've ever seen in a theater

Verity Robins Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

Allison Davies The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

Hattie I didn’t really have many expectations going into the movie (good or bad), but I actually really enjoyed it. I really liked the characters and the banter between them.

Soph Bower After seeing the cover and trailer for this film it seemed like a great pick.. How wrong was I! It starts and stops a lot - definitely lacks continuity - and looks as though it was made in 1995 never mind just set then. The actual film is okay I guess, it all makes you want to keep watching despite the poor storyline to see who is behind these mysterious cameras, gifts and notes being left on people's door steps. The highlight for me really was how excited the guy dressed as a clown got doing his treasure hunt so to speak. The couple and young girl who were being tormented in their homes however - very boring. A few jumpy moments but nothing terribly scary or watch worthy unfortunately. The end was particularly confusing and disappointing for me.. 2 guns yet 4 people get shot dead all at once? And don't even get me started on a group of children being behind the whole thing! Absolutely ridiculous and very unrealistic.. It's an okay watch, but it won't be near the top of my recommendation list I can assure you, and I'm certainly not in a hurry to watch it again.

Tyler Obrien Though low on gore and shock value, this film actually exceeded my expectations on great scenes that kept the hand-held recorder believable without being blurry or shaky. The character development wasn't the strongest, but the portrayal of the fairly one- dimensional characters was spot on by the actors. The final scene and the way the plot threaded through the three perspectives was for me very successful. Those who enjoy the psycho-thriller genre should enjoy this film! The only really disappointing thing about this film is that there were not enough of the "clues" and contraptions by the people setting the entire game up. I also would have enjoyed some exposition about whether this game had been played previously by the antagonists (no spoilers) or if this was the first iteration of this game. I really enjoyed the "clown, family, girl" motif and if a sequel were to come out where the dynamics of the plot shifted but with the same motif I would surely watch. Overall, a very well done film that met the expectations it set up.

bob_meg After 8 years of either being unwilling or unable to make The Strangers II (even after massive prodding from fans), Bryan Bertino has emerged with what has to be the oddest entry to date in the Found Footage genre. Excuse all the comparisons to The Strangers in this review --- but the two films are extremely similar in story.When The Strangers was released, I saw it on opening day and it had a huge build-up from a very disturbing trailer. Although it had a lot going for it in the scares department, helped immensely by solid performances from Liv Tyler and Scott Speedman, I was ultimately disappointed by it. I savaged it in my review on IMDb as being too thin and derivative and that might not have been entirely fair. It did have its virtuoso moments and a prevailing creepy mood. I just felt it didn't add enough original layers of fear beyond being chased by a bogeyman.Most traditional horror films have some kind of Act One Setup. Though The Strangers attempted this, I never thought it succeeded. I never thought enough time was spent on the characters of Kristin and Jim (Tyler and Speedman) to engage us fully in their terror and fight for survival. Perhaps Tyler and Speedman were just too convincing and thus harder to disengage from when Bertino gave them little to work with, plot-wise.With a storyline this thin (little background on protagonists, no motivation for antagonist, almost immediate intro of A Threat), an almost constant barrage of non-stop terror is required and that is difficult to sustain for a full-length feature. Again, the Strangers tried but, after the one hour mark, largely lost steam. Only two other movies that I've seen have really been able to do this effectively throughout: namely Them (2006) and High Tension (2003). And the fact that The Strangers is almost a direct crib of Them didn't impress me (with the slight change being the age of the antagonists).The good news about Mockingbird is that, even though it doesn't develop it's characters much more than The Strangers, they aren't characters that are critical to develop. Bertino also segments the narrative with frequent title cards that encourage even more disengagement. At times, Bertino seems to be egging us on to --- yes --- "mock" his triumvirate of gullible idiots in Mockingbird. More emotional distance would seem to mean more traditional scares are in store, right? Well, not really.There is The Family, The Woman, and The Clown, all of them kind of pathetic characters in some regard, who basically spend the entire film being terrorized and mentally tortured by an unseen adversary with a lot of time or money on their hands. The premise is simple: accept a free video camera and keep filming, or die. I found that idea a little more interesting, cryptic, and diabolical than the standard stalk-and-slash. I equate real terror more to dread and fear (at the movies anyway) and Bertino nicely controls this with Mockingbird, and he gets fairly inventive with the torments too. The scariest part of The Strangers, to me, was the first forty minutes when the antagonists were virtually off screen. Mockingbird is more like an extended version of that segment, with more palpable tension because the terror is simply spread out in one unrelenting, though low frequency, undercurrent. Unfortunately, it's offset by the fact that it's fairly easy to see where things are going from about the movie's halfway-point. The reason why these victims were chosen becomes a bit too obvious.The ending, too, is vastly anti-climactic and yet another steal from Them. Bertino is well capable of creating ominous moods and surprising us with occasional jump-in-your-seat scares. But with Mockingbird, one senses he needs some fresh inspiration. I have a hard time believing his core cult audience for The Strangers (the people who spend hours writing potential sequel stories and posting them on the message boards here) are going to be able to sit still long enough for Mockingbird to really get rolling and then be happy with the results. If you want in-your-face scares, Mockingbird isn't that kind of fowl at all --- but it's still kind of foul in its own gleefully sadistic way.

moviesmaniax What a mess from the director of The Strangers. Keep filming or someone will die, the film actually has an interesting plot and concept but sadly turns into a mess with its ridiculous ending and an insult to the audience The SCARE here is similar to The Strangers and some of the scenes are quite effective and intense in delivering that but don't go in expecting any GORES here. The film starts out pretty interesting and engaging but gets more tiring as it goes and ends with a hugely unsatisfied and stupid twist. Overall, this is one of those found footage films that fails to deliver its premise and enough thrills or scares and is ultimately just a waste of time. >>C-<<