‘The Last Footage’ Is a Gritty, Confining Found-Footage Assault [Fantasia Review]

“Sounds like a line from a horror movie.”

Horror’s found-footage genre has a low barrier of entry due to its inherently lo-fi, small-budget nature. This accessibility is exactly why found-footage is such an exciting horror format that can inspire innovation and creativity when it’s properly utilized. Unfortunately, for every subversive and ambitious found-footage triumph there are considerably more lazy misfires that exploit the format without saying anything deeper about this intimate style of filmmaking. This has led to many general audiences dismissing the majority of found-footage horror except when it’s a breakout success like The Blair Witch Project, Paranormal Activity, and the V/H/S franchise.

Found-footage is still a genre with high highs and low lows, and there have been some really encouraging triumphs from the past few years, like Host, Frogman, Man Finds Tape, Late Night With the Devil, or even Curry Barker’s Milk and Serial, that are helping rewrite the found-footage narrative. Arker Soe Oo’s debut feature film, The Last Footage, is not just Myanmar’s first found-footage movie, but the first film to be entirely shot with 4K Pro camera glasses. 

What follows is a horror story that basically plays out in real-time. This approach, while ultra bare-bones in its own way, still makes The Last Footage feel like a modern evolution of the found-footage genre that successfully justifies its footage and presentation style. A simple nature getaway among friends leads to cursed rituals, resurrections, and supernatural creatures. The Last Footage is Paranormal Activity meets The Ritual, with a standout final act that doesn’t hold back.

An extended group of friends plan a relaxing trip to a cabin in Wingabar Forest when they inadvertently stumble upon something considerably more sinister. The Last Footage doesn’t break the mold in terms of its story structure and, like many other found-footage films, it takes some time to get moving. That being said, is well crafted and shows a lot of promise from debut director Arker Soe Oo. A domino effect of darkness sweeps over these travelers once a boy disappears and a grieving witch demands justice.