V/H/S (2012)

You would think by now we would have moved beyond the "found footage" trend, what with The Blair Witch Project 13 years behind us. But Paranormal Activity raked in nearly $200,000,00 on its paltry $15,000 budget and assured us at least 10 more years of shaky-cam scares. And here's the thing: I'm perfectly okay with that. When done right this is one of my favorite styles of horror.

V/H/S tries to refresh the art of faux-found footage by addressing one of its challenges. Two hour running times really stretch the limit of believability when it comes to normal people carrying video cameras around everywhere. Start adding sequels on top of it (Paranormal Activity 2, 3, and coming soon to a theater near you, 4!) and you've pretty much lost me. V/H/S is, instead, an anthology made up of six stories by six different directors. While neither found footage or anthologies are unique, it's the combination of the two that make this film enjoyable.

The main story concerns a group of criminals who break into a house to steal a tape. They don't know what's on it or even why it's important. Inside they find a corpse and not just one, but several tapes that some of them decide to watch while the others search the basement. This framework plays out well as we discover what's on the tapes but also what's happening with the crooks in this mysterious house. I won't go into details about the individual stories… they're so short that I would only ruin it.

What I enjoyed most was the playful tension between gritty reality and gruesome absurdity. That's a hard balance to find, but each director nailed it. The gore is downright disgusting (you may have heard about people passing out during screenings) but counterpointed beautifully by the random and the comic.

Should you watch V/H/S? Even if you're not a huge fan of the genre, the movie holds its own and I consider it a must-watch.