Baghead (2008)

That was an excellent one.

Good story, Not enough for a whole film

Wow! What a bizarre film! Unfortunately the few funny moments there were were quite overshadowed by it's completely weird and random vibe throughout.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

'Baghead' is an obvious budget flick but don't let that stop you from choosing this to watch.The plot revolves around Matt that wants to make an independent film for a indie film showing. He gathers his friends and they just happen to be Chad (an old friend) and two girls. He suggest a trip to a lakeside cottage for brainstorming on their budget movie storyline.The plot line they agree upon begins to strangely start happening in real life!! Sure enough there's something afoot. And in that lays the store for this movie.At finish there is a moral message (if you can't figure it out you need help) and a somewhat painful but happy ending.

Baghead (2008) ** (out of 4) Bizarre mixture of comedy and horror via THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT style as four wannabe filmmakers go to a cabin in the woods where they plan on writing a screenplay that will get them into Hollywood. They decide to write a story about four people in a cabin being stalked by a psycho with a bag on his head and sure enough a real psycho with a bag on his head shows up. This film is a real mixed bag because there were elements that I liked and elements that I didn't but when the film was over I felt rather letdown by everything that had happened. I think the film started out pretty good as we get some fun dialogue dealing with four young people wanting to break into the movies but the second half of the film is when things don't go as well. We've had several movies where our "actors" go out to do something simple and then end up having to deal with the real thing. Bob Clark's CHILDREN SHOULDN'T PLAY WITH DEAD THINGS come to mind and of course THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT somewhat hit on this idea. The problem here is that the horror elements are extremely weak and they're never scary nor do any of them come at us as being real. The movie really seems confused as to what it wants to be because there's a lot of stuff dealing with Hollywood, some stuff dealing with relationships and then we get the horror stuff, which seems to come and go without any rhyme or reason. As one would expect, there's a twist towards the end that somewhat works but it's not as shocking as I'm sure the filmmakers wanted it to be. Performances aren't too bad for this type of film and the direction shows some nice touches throughout. While this film isn't a complete success or failure, it might be of interest to those who enjoy shoe string budgeted horror films.

Baghead is a pretty impressive little indie horroresque film. From the makers of the award winning film the puffy chair comes this mockumentary of sorts. It tells the story of a group of friends interested in shooting a low budget film over the weekend. But things go bad when their films imaginary villain begins stalking them one by one. It all sounds fairly generic but it's delivered with undeniable wit and clever humor. the performances are strong enough and the film keeps you going past its surprisingly effective conclusion. the great thing about this film is how real it feels and when it does begin to switch gears it doesn't feel forced in least. a plausible effort on everyones part with a hope to see more genre efforts come from this group of talented people.

The movie features a single shaky cam. This is not because the movie is independent, has a low budget or is part of some dogmatic dogma-movement. Well these three could all be true, but the main reason of a "shaky cam" is that it has relevance for the story, similar to a movie like Blairwitch Project. If you expect fast camera movement, multiple angles, supreme lightning and great special effects you shouldn't watch Baghead at all (and people should not devalue it because it doesn't look like the new Spiderman). So be prepared for primitive (but still quite amazing) photography.Furthermore no one should watch this movie because of the suspense. The suspense is only a minor aspect of Baghead. From time to time it tries to scare you by being as real as possible. Occasionally Baghead succeeds in doing so. Although the average person would feel conned if I tell him this is a thriller or a horror. It is more close to a real life drama.Personally I truly appreciate the endeavour to create a real movie without all the modern techniques. Techniques that so bluntly tell you you are watching something produced. There is no real score, no atonal violins at scary moments, no special effects and so on. Without this kind of tools a lot more weight is put on the acting and the story. The question then is: does the movie survive the lack of all these elements? Yes.The acting is surprisingly refreshing. Although Greta Gerwig (playing Michelle) annoyed me from time to time. The story itself is not original but the characters are convincing, there are many interesting twists and there are reflexive side aspects to the story that lift it far above the average kind of "some people in a mountain shed getting scared" movie. Most importantly the whole movie has a natural flow without any scene feeling constructed for one purpose or the other. If you plan to watch this movie then watch it for the real and convincing manner it is brought to you, not for suspense or Hollywood skills.In my view the colossal problem of Baghead though is the editing. It appears that all footage was neurotically and compulsory preserved in the final film. Quite often entirely predictable scenes drag on and on. Though they may look more real so to speak (for instance the scene where Chad is trying to hit on Michelle), they get one ready for bed immediately, no teeth brushing required. Especially the final scene is horribly slow and you can really hear yourself thinking: "get a move on all right!" In total the movie runs for about 2 hours. In general I like slow and long movies, but this one could really do with a 1:30 running time. It would not just be easier, faster and more accessible, it would have simply been better.Verdict: 6