Evidence (2012)

Review

Ryan, his girlfriend Abi, and Ryan's best mate Brett along with Abi's friend Ashley head out into the woods to do a bit of camping, drinking, and whatever else you do off the beaten track. Naturally Ryan has brought his camera to record the camping weekend as Brett has never been camping before. Yes Ryan is that dude, the one who wants to be a documentary film maker, hence he gets into everyone's face with a camera. Disregarding a "Do Not Trespass" sign the four journey into the wilderness and on their first night are confronted by strange noises in the surrounding bush. Worse is to follow with some nameless dude packing a gun dropping by one evening asking if the group have seen any lost dogs.

As day dawns they discover some sort of creature in a ravine and things start to unravel quickly. Brett thinks Ryan is a sociopath, both Abi and Ashley are getting pissed off with the camera constantly intruding, and Ryan proves to be a complete arsehole. Not helping any are increasing attacks by strange creatures, Brett going missing on the second night, and hey is that a less than abandoned secret military research facility? Things are about to get completely chaotic and out of control, hold onto your linen we're going in.

Wow Evidence is really dividing viewers, and I'm discounting the internet trolls here, between those that love the movie, those that have a few problems with it, and of course a third group that really don't understand what found footage is about. Yes the movie is a true found footage flick harking back to The Blair Witch Project days without the modern unnecessary need to add high production values or a sound track or multiple cameras. Found footage is "found", i.e. it's unedited footage from a camera found by whomever. Director Howie Askins is across the requirements and goes to painful lengths to ensure that Evidence rings true, which of course is never going to work for those out there that need everything looking like a Hollywood conveyor belt effort with everything neatly labelled and everything explained. If you are after this sort of movie then by all means knock yourself out, if however you want to try something slightly more left field then read on, Evidence isn't playing to a mainstream audience.

Director Askins starts his movie and uses the first block to establish a typical found footage situation. We meet the grist for the mill, find out where they are heading that will put them in harm's way, and establish whether or not we are going to like the characters or not. Fairly standard stuff, and Askins achieves the requirements without wasting unnecessary running time, though to be honest I'm not entirely sure viewers will have any sympathy for the four leads. The middle block of the movie starts to introduce the scary element horror movies require, gives a reason for people to stay in Dodge - something a lot of found footage movies fail to achieve, before unleashing hell. For mine the monsters that we gradually get to see more of during the middle block are well worth the price of admission, think the aliens from Attack the Block (2011). During the final block the movie just goes crazy mad, and puts us in entirely different territory to what we had supposed we would be in. Military research gone wrong folks, and that's never a good notion in a horror movie of any sort. I was having a hoot during the final block and got a real Doom (2005) meets The Crazies (2010) vibe from what I was watching.

Okay I'm not going to sugar coat this one kids, there is a lot of shaky cam going down that could be nauseating to some viewers. You tend to get that going down when people keep on filming while running for their lives. Interestingly, to those of us who are anally retentive, the camera in use is a Cannon, the same sort that my wife coincidentally uses for photographing food porn. So yes shaky cam, single angles, and there's no attempt being made to edit the footage to one of those Hollywood pretend vehicles that ring false at every step.

As mentioned earlier you are going to find it hard to find any sympathy for the four lead characters who demonstrate the worse in human nature as things hit the fan. Ryan is a complete twat at the best of times, self centered and showing scant regard for his girlfriend or best mate, Brett is a bit of a whiney bitch to be honest, and the girls simply scream and go hysterical at the drop of a hat. While the girls could be excused in the final act, where they find nowhere is safe, it was getting a bit Heather in the middle block. Thankfully we don't have to sit through a monologue to camera as happened in The Blair Witch Project. So to a certain extent Director Askins fails to raise the necessary sympathy for his characters we need in order to become involved with them, but on the other hand this may very well not be a requirement of found footage. Don't think any of us would be at our best if faced with what this happy band of campers encounter out in the bush.

I'm not about to give away any spoilers about what happens in the final block of the movie, this site after all isn't AICN, it's the readers privilege to find out for themselves, but just a few words. Nothing in this movie is explained, you either infer what has happened or you are going to be left floundering. So if you need every single detail spelt out in a movie then you are going to be in trouble, however if you have an IQ above double figures then you should be right. Fingers crossed the film makers are planning on a sequel sometime in the future to rock out the ending a bit more.

If gore is your thing then you are going to be slightly miffed, there is a tad of viscera here and there but all kills are off camera, once again found footage single camera time. Equally T&A is restricted to Abigail Richie giving a quick boob flash early in the movie. Sorry to disappoint here folks, but heck I just write about things.

So another found footage movie that pushes the boundaries just a bit more to keep things interesting. Evidence worked for me, but as explained above may not be your cup of B+, if you have an open mind about your viewing material then well worth a look. I'm throwing a recommendation at the movie, it definitely deserves to garner an audience. While the flick isn't likely to gain mainstream support on the evidence of a couple of viewings it might just have a cult thing going down.