Originally published on Set The Tape
The found footage horror genre has been around for a long while, and whilst some people lay the creation of the genre at the feet of 1999’s The Blair Witch Project it began much earlier with the first released found footage movie Cannibal Holocaust in 1980, and Orson Welles created the found footage film The Other Side of the Wind almost a decade before that (though it wouldn’t be released until 2018).
Whilst you can argue as to when it actually started, the genre has definitely expanded over the last couple of decades, thanks in part to this type of film being much cheaper and easier to produce thanks to advances in camera technology. The anthology series V/H/S has taken advantage of that since day one, and has released several films in the series. Now, the latest two releases, V/H/S/85 and V/H/S/94 are available on Blu-ray for those that don’t have access to the Shudder streaming service.
V/H/S/85, as the title suggests, is set during the 1980s, when home cameras first started making the switch from film to VHS tapes. Whilst previous V/H/S films have featured fairly obvious framing devices, such as people finding a collection of evil video tapes, this film is instead structured as a single tape, one that has been used over and over again, with different recordings coming in at different points. Sometimes you get snippets of TV shows and adverts, but for the most part the framing device is one of the five stories on offer, with the other four stories interrupting a documentary programme recorded off the television.
The five stories include the already mentioned documentary ‘Total Copy’, that takes a look at a university experiment around a shapeshifting alien entity; ‘No Wake’ which sees some young holiday makers stumble across a holiday camp they shouldn’t enter; ‘God of Death’ which follows an earthquake in Mexico that hits a TV news studio; the performance art segment ‘TKNOGD’ which sees a woman trying to contact the God of VR; and ‘Dreamkill’ which sees the police receiving tapes of grisly murders before they happen.
As with every other V/H/S release, the film is something of a mixed bag in terms of quality of story. ‘Total Copy’ is perhaps the most frustrating of the segments, in part due to the fact that it’s spread across the almost two hour run time. The story is broken up by the other stories, meaning that there’s often twenty minutes or more before we come back to it, and it often feels like you only get around five minutes of it at a time. ‘TKNOGD’ is also pretty weak, as if you’re not into odd performance art it drags a lot, and much of it will leave you waiting for something actually interesting to happen; though when it does it takes up so little time and feels so obvious and predictable that you’re left wondering if it was worth it.
‘No Wake’ is fun, with some decent moments spread throughout, and it comes with a little surprise along the way that made it one of the more fun stories in the mix. ‘God of Death’ is the one story in the film that I’d have happily seen translated into an entire movie. Following a group of rescue workers, we discover that the earthquake has released something ancient and evil, and it makes for a delightful experience. It’s also really delightful to see a non American segment, presented with subtitles, that brings something a bit different to the table. ‘Dreamkill’ has shades of V/H/S by way of Sinister, and the films within the film are well done and creepy enough that they unsettle the viewer thanks to the direction, effects work, and music. Sadly, the main part of the story does drop in quality by the end, but is still a really good journey along the way.
V/H/S/94 does things a little differently, and uses the kind of framing device that will feel more familiar to those that have watched the original V/H/S movie. Following a group of cops who raid a warehouse, we discover a strange cult/experiment where people are being made to watch awful tapes that lead them to their deaths. The SWAT team find disturbing videos such as ‘Storm Drain’, which follows a news reporter as she searches for information on the urban legend Ratman; ‘The Empty Wake’ which sees a young funeral home worker alone with a coffin that keeps making noises; the dark and twisted ‘The Subject’ follows the experiments of a mad scientist; and ‘Terror’ sees a group of military militiamen preparing to storm and kill a government building when something horrific happens to them all.
The framing segment for the film is easily the weakest thing on offer here, and its vagueness doesn’t help it much. Due to the action cutting back between each other segment you begin to forget that it’s a thing until you’re thrust back into it, which is usually at a point when some other twist or turn of the story occurs. Perhaps it would feel better if presented as single piece, but as it is you kind of don’t care about it.
‘Storm Drain’ is a very traditional use of the found footage genre, with it being filmmakers searching for the truth. The interviews with local residents at the start is quite fun, and the dark sewer locations they explore feel creepy before anything even happens. ‘The Empty Wake’ does things a little differently, being set all in one location, with all of the cameras being static. Having been set up to record a wake, the main character moves around the location separate from the cameras, only ever controlling them at one point in the film. It also manages to build tension nicely throughout.
‘The Subject’ will feel incredibly familiar to someone who has played horror video games. Much of it is recorded from the POV of one of the victims of a mad scientist, and plays out on screen like a first person shooter, complete with a battery bar that acts as the health for the character. It’s very over the top, with some ridiculous designs and silly, gory action, but it will definitely appeal to gamers. The final segment, ‘Terror’, feels the most creative and left me fascinated throughout. The story gives you enough hints that you can figure out what’s happening just before it spells it out for you, but it never feels like it’s made obvious or that you’ve outsmarted the film. It seems like there’s one segment in each V/H/S release that I’d like to see expanded on, and this is the one for V/H/S/94.
Both releases come with audio commentaries that offer some insight into the films and each of the segments, and offers a good reason to watch through the films a second time to learn a little more about them. Apart from that, the V/H/S/85 release is a bit lacking in terms of extras, only coming with the uninterrupted version of the framing story, and some silent footage from another. V/H/S/94 offers a little more, coming with a behind the scenes feature, a comic con panel interview, and some deleted and extended scenes. Overall, both films are enjoyable enough, though don’t really set your world on fire. They’re a decent way to spend a couple of hours for horror fans who might not have Shudder access.
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