Not Only The Blair Witch Project: 5 Most Terrifying Mockumentary Horror Movies
These projects amaze and horrify with their realism.
Since the 2000s, horror filmmakers have been quick to embrace the pseudo-documentary format: it can be used to make cheap but very effective films that audiences will easily believe because it seems like everything on screen really happened.
1. Creep, 2014
Cameraman Aaron, looking for money, accepts an offer from a mysterious man named Josef: the man goes to the country house of a client dying of cancer and prepares to film his last days.
However, everything is not so simple: in fact, the stranger is a serial killer, and he invited Aaron not as a man with a film camera, but as a new victim.
Creep is perhaps the most realistic pseudo-documentary horror on the list. The writers and stars, Patrick Brice and Mark Duplass, improvised many lines and made changes to the script on the fly.
2. Cloverfield, 2008
A giant monster is attacking New York. A group of friends, led by Rob, try to get out of the city and capture the events on a handheld camera.
Cloverfield boasts a serious studio scale: a $25 million horror disaster showing destruction, explosions and shootouts against the backdrop of a giant monster attacking the city.
The movie is not in the vein of REC and Paranormal Activity, but rather in the spirit of Roland Emmerich's The Day After Tomorrow and 2012.
3. The Bay, 2012
A wave of a mysterious parasitic epidemic is sweeping through a small town on the shores of the Chesapeake Bay. People are covered in horrible blisters and abscesses, and their limbs and organs are being eaten from the inside out by mysterious creatures.
One of the few survivors, journalist Donna, edits a film that tells the story of the catastrophe.
Rain Man director Barry Levinson unexpectedly retrained as a horror filmmaker and made one of the most naturalistic disaster films in the history of cinema.
4. REC, 2007
Young journalist Angela Vidal is filming a story in a high-rise building. Unbeknownst to her, a deadly zombie virus has spread throughout the building, making it almost impossible to escape.
The Spanish pseudo-documentary horror is reminiscent of the video game Outlast: the main character ends up in an isolated room with monsters and villains and fights her way to freedom step by step.
Every few minutes, directors Jaume Balagueró and Paco Plaza add new challenges to Angela's path: these can be new bloodthirsty corpses, as well as other people.
5. Mortal Remains, 2013
Young directors Chris and Mark are making a documentary about The Blair Witch Project, but the director of the classic 1990s mockumentary, Eduardo, offers them a much more interesting subject: cult auteur Karl Atticus.
According to rumors, the man filmed real corpses in his films and practiced black magic, and all of the creator's movies burned in a fire.
The two filmmakers decide to investigate this story and begin interviewing experts, despite the fact that those around them strongly advise them to stay away from Karl Atticus.