The Gracefield Incident (2017)

One of my all time favorites.

Ok... Let's be honest. It cannot be the best movie but is quite enjoyable. The movie has the potential to develop a great plot for future movies

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

I have never been this angry at a movie!! It was funny at first with the clumsy dialogue and first grade thanksgiving pageant acting but now I'm just mad I've pissed away and hour and a half on this garbage. I would prefer Plan 9 From Outer Space-at least some real effort was made there.

Saw 'The Gracefield Incident', being fond of horror regardless of budget (even if not my favourite genre) and being intrigued somewhat by the idea. Was also a bit apprehensive, because of having a general dislike of "found footage" films. Being behind on my film watching and reviewing, with a long to watch and review list that keeps getting longer, it took me a while to get round to reviewing it.Unfortunately, despite not reading any reviews purposefully before watching, am going to have to agree with all the reviewers who disliked 'The Gracefield Incident'. It doesn't even start off good, with an opening that immediately betrays inexperience technically and narratively, and rapidly got even worse by a second half that makes one not want to keep watching. Never judge a film without seeing the whole thing and wanted to give 'The Gracefield Incident', so gave it a fair chance. There are worse "found footage" films, but on top of looking cheap there is nothing new or interesting and it does contain some of the worst sound editing, script, camera work and acting seen in a long time and ever.Setting is spooky, but wasted by the cheapness of the rest of the production values.However, so much brings 'The Gracefield Incident' down. Everything is doused in inexperience and the direction fails to generate any tension or suspense with the direction of the actors being abysmal and continuous struggles in making things coherent. Too much of the soundtrack is intrusive and ill-fitting, made worse by the excessive, terribly and cheaply recorded and obvious sound effects that just cheapens the mood. The "found footage" camera work is enough to make one physically ill and has no coherence.Where 'The Gracefield Incident' most underwhelms is the writing and story. The writing is incredibly lazy and so cringe-worthy taking it seriously is impossible, it's awkward in dialogue, very confused as a result of not tying things up or going into full detail and doesn't feel complete. Story, one can actually be forgiven for mistaking the film as plot-less, suffers from a very limp pace apparent early on and gets slower and slower until an interminably dragged out second half. It further suffers from feeling too much like a short film stretched out with a lot of useless padding and repetition. None of the characters are likeable, little is learnt about them and they are annoying, the inconsistent, utterly face-palming stupid and illogical motivations and decision making bring them down further. The acting ranges from bad to downright terrible, a lot of sleepwalking and histrionics and that they don't seem to care about their situation let alone frightened of it is especially obvious. For a film billed as a horror, there is very little interesting and nothing remotely scary. They are too few and are far too predictable, anaemic and weakly timed to make impact, with the lifelessly dull pacing and obvious sound effects cheapening them significantly. 'The Gracefield Incident' doesn't engage let alone thrill, and a lot of it is silly to unintentional hilarity and doesn't make sense with a fair few loose ends. No creative moments and the poorly used aliens look goofy and lack any kind of menace. The ending is a head-scratcher, both in confusion and how little it feels like an ending.Overall, the potential was there but the execution far from was. Really awful, unless you're curious about seeing it it's best to avoid this. 1/10 Bethany Cox

Matthew and Jessica are on their way to the hospital. Jess is pregnant and they're going to their second ultrasound to learn the sex of the baby. Matthew is recording a video journal and in the midst of it, they get T-Boned.The accident causes Jess to miscarriage, but also takes out Matthew's right eye.One year later, Matthew is installing an iPhone camera into a prosthetic eye to record a party over the weekend.Along with two other couples, the weekend excursion is at Matt's boss's house. His boss is letting them use it as part of recovery for Matt's accident. He's also a conspiracy theorist/trapper and built the property to catch a sasquatch.Matt's friend Joe brings along his new DSLR camera and is also frequently recording.During the party, a meteorite hits and Matt and Joe go to investigate...That's essentially the jist. Mathieu Ratthe wrote and directed what could have been a brilliant movie. Instead what we got was something that was almost good.The acting was at times forced and wooden. Other times it wasn't terrible. The plot involved stupid people doing things they shouldn't be doing - like sticking their arm in a strange meteorite. There seriously could have been a better catalyst for everything. The ending was a bit disappointing as well. It wasn't badly written, but I felt it was badly delivered.That being said, there WERE some good points in this. The movie involves aliens (not sasquatch), and we only truly see the alien at the end (see my previous statement). The scenes where the alien is involved have great tension and deliver some pretty good jump scares.Also, the direction is done really well. The cast may not have done a great job, but Mr. Ratthe has his vision and I only hope he improves. Also, the production values were very good for being a low budget film.As some people know. I've become a fan of found footage movies over the years. The best in recent memory were Chronicle, The Frankenstein Theory, Diary of the Dead, and of course, Cloverfield. With a little more refinement this could have joined that group. In fact, this could have worked out as a Cloverfield movie. If it had a bigger budget...who knows?All in all, the bad in this outweighed the good. The potential to be great is there. Mr. Ratthe just needs a little more time and the right support behind him.Frankly, I hope he gets it.

The Gracefield Incident starts promisingly, it even comes up with a concept to justify the whole thing being recorded and I started to think this might surprise.Alas it didn't, in fact within about 20 minutes it soon descends into that found formula footage we've had shoved down our throats for the past couple of decades and brings no originality to the table.Group of 20 somethings go out to have fun in a secluded cabin and become targeted by aliens. Thats basically it.Kudos to them for the sfx because though they aren't fantastic at least they didn't do the usual thing of not showing you anything to keep the budget down.The film isn't without its moments but ultimately this is just yet another flawed found footage mess.The Good: Great twist on the justification for still recording when crap is going down Nice selection of movie posters Decent enough startThe Bad: Becomes real generic real fast Lifeless cast Things I Learnt From This Movie: In the presence of evil aliens even balloons will flee