Review #59: Grave Encounters (2011)

This review was originally written in October 2019.

October Horror Movie Review #7: Grave Encounters

I'll get this right out there: I loved this movie. It's not perfect, but if you ever need evidence that there's a difference between good and bad found-footage I would compare this movie to something like The Dark Tapes. There are so many things this movie did that puts it above and beyond the others, that I'm shocked this wasn't a huge hit.

Grave Encounters is presented as a ghost-hunting TV show about to do an eight-hour lock in inside an old haunted mental hospital. However, it begins with an interview with a TV producer explaining that this show had promise- but the episode we're about to see... turned out to be their final episode. We're shown some of the behind-the-scenes footage as they film the usual patter, paying the groundskeeper to fake a ghost sighting, asking some "random teens" about a spooky encounter they had, and having a resident "psychic" recount the supernatural feelings he's getting from the hospital. Things start to go wrong, however, when they unexpectedly have some actual supernatural encounters, and then the exit is somehow replaced with another twisting hallway, and one by one they start to go missing...

There's definitely some problems with this movie. First, like most found-footage, most of the film is incredibly shaky. I get it, that's part of the medium (and much of the found-footageness of this film is surely meant to be hyperbolic due to the satirical nature of the show they are portraying), but it gets a little old a little fast. Would it kill these fake documentarists to invest in a steadycam or two?

Second, the movie definitely started to lose my interest a bit as we neared the end. It was SO CREEPY when the layout of the hospital began to change or when the night seemed to last for days, but then when it's just the main character running from some spooky monsters I was ready for it to be over about ten minutes sooner than it was.

And finally (this is definitely a minor gripe), the hospital was ridiculously clean and well-kept for being ostensibly derelict. Like, there's graffiti in the entry hall, but then every other room is swept clean, spotless, and graffiti-free? For the number of rooms with paint chipping from the ceiling you almost never see a speck of dust on the floor. If this place was actually abandoned enough for teens to get inside like is described early in the movie, every square inch would either be filthy, covered in spray paint, or have holes punched in it. A minor complaint for sure, but they could have just removed all of the indoor graffiti (leaving the tag on the front door for the later reveal) and said that it was locked up so tight nobody could get inside.

Whatever the case, I thought this was a great movie with a perfectly-timed slow burn and once it got going I was 100% on board. I just wish it could have wrapped up a bit faster before it started losing steam.

Overall rating: 9/10

Most Adorable Actors: The little baby rats that were trying to look menacing

Tun in tomorrow for a classic: The Exorcist!