Unfriended

To make a movie involving the found footage genre, it must be incredibly difficult to replicate the success the genre once did for The Blair Witch Project, Cloverfield & the Paranormal Activity series. One movie underwhelming attempted to experiment with found footage using only a Skype camera, is a movie called Unfriended.

Unfriended was released in 2014. It received divided reactions from critics and audiences members alike. Plus it made enough money to surpass its $1 million dollar budget at the box office.

In recent news, it is confirmed that a sequel titled, “Unfriended: Game Night,” is coming out this March. This has nothing to do with the upcoming film Game Night starring Jason Bateman & Rachel McAdams.

The following reviews contains crucial SPOILERS. If you’ve never seen this film, read at your own risk.

Positive & Negative Elements

Positive: The Cast consists of unknown actors, they all did a good job on their performances.

The Universal logo has a lagging issue, indicating that this is gonna be filmed entirely on a Skype camera.

During a fatal game of “Never I Have Ever,” each person reveals their deepest darkest secrets.

Death Scenes were solid with each character meeting their karmic fate.

Blaire’s deceased friend, Laura, is The Ghost who seeks revenge on Blaire for posting an embarrassing video that drove her to suicide.

Negative: A massive Plot Hole involving nobody turning off their computers. If a ghost possessing my laptop, I would definitely need to shut it down. It’s as if nobody watched Eddie Murphy’s stand-up comedy routine involving haunted houses. He claims if a person in real life stumbles upon a haunted house, he would rather leave the area. Gonna have to Double Down this con for making every single character a complete simpleton like Chief Wiggum’s son Ralph, from The Simpsons! It broke my Suspension Of Disbelief!

After one final scare and I’m gonna be brutally honest, the film ends with a pop song that feels entirely out of left field. Imagine if Cloverfield or Paranormal Activity ended with Rusted Root’s one hit wonder “Send Me On The Way?” You know the song from Ice Age or Mathilda? Wouldn’t a found footage horror movie end with a feel good pop tune that doesn’t fit the sinister atmosphere?

Nobody in this movie doesn’t have any redeeming qualities. They’re all just a bunch of unsympathetic meatbags who are not nice!

Before the film ends, the camera switches to Blaire’s Perspective Of View (POV for short) just to give us a jump scare that unintentionally ruined the immersion. It could’ve ended with Blaire turning a camcorder as she attempts to flee her house, then Laura’s ghost attacks her.

Product Placement featuring several brands such as, Skype, Facebook, Google, Instagram, YouTube, Spotify, Twitter, iMessage & Forever 21. They can be shown on Blaire’s laptop screen on her tabs bar.

Marketing for the movie showed some death scenes that were never shown in the theatrical cut and were replaced with different ones. Talk about The Ol’ Bait & Switch routine. Turns out it was all a lie!

Speaking of marketing, a trailer for the film gives away two deaths scenes and Blaire cheating on her boyfriend. Oh boy, who hired Billy from The Grim Adventures Of Billy & Mandy as the person responsibility incompetent to promote Unfriended?!

The Final Verdict: D, FOR DOGGIE DOO DOO!

In my opinion, Unfriended is a disappointing failure attempting to experiment with a film shot entirely on a Skype camera. If you want to watch a way  better found footage movie to get your scare on, I highly recommend Cloverfield or Paranomral Activity. Those are the films you want to be entertained and not feel easily underwhelmed. I bet Unfriended: Game Night is gonna be a future disappointment.