Adam Green starts working on a documentary about monster/creature artwork. Out of the blue, a man suddenly contacts him and claims he has proof of the existence of monsters. This man’s name is William Dekker, and he is a retired detective who is convinced that there’s underground monsters in a place he calls “The Marrow”. Green sees this as an opportunity to refocus his documentary into the story of Dekker and his efforts to expose these so-called underground monsters. They set up cameras in the woods nearby the hole where Dekker claims the monsters sometimes come out from, but Green and his crew are not sure whether this man is just setting up an elaborate hoax, or if he is just batshit crazy…or, maybe, if he’s actually telling the truth.
Digging Up the Marrow is a mockumentary-style horror film directed by Adam Green (yes, the same name as the protagonist, he is actually playing himself). The concept behind the movie is inspired by a fan mail sent to him by a guy named Alex Pardee. Later, Green met Pardee at a convention, where he shared his concept story which was about an artist that got commissioned to paint so-called real monsters. While the movie is made in pure mockumentary-style, the filmmakers actually decided to use a famous actor in the role as the crazy monster hunter Dekker, as they didn’t want the movie to come off as an attempted hoax. Thus, Ray Wise (Twin Peaks, 24, Robocop, etc.) was cast for the role. This does, of course, take away from the feeling of being “genuine” (which is usually what mockumentaries aim for), but Wise does a great job with portraying the slightly unbalanced monster hunter.
As for the effects used in the film, they’re actually pretty decent. Most of the effects used in the film were practical, based off of Pardee’s designs. The team had a bit of trouble when creating fully working animatronics though, due to Pardee’s designs being a tad bit too surreal…however, Green said he wanted to use designs that were unique, rather than doing something generic which the viewers had already seen many times before. And of course, it’s always fun seeing some dude playing a monster while dressed up in a full rubber costume!
So overall, Digging Up the Marrow is an easy watch and enjoyable enough. It is not a fast-paced creature feature flick, which should be obvious with the choice of filming it as a faux documentary, and there are more than a few dull moments. Still, it’s imaginative and compelling enough to entertain.
Director: Adam Green
Country & year: USA, 2014
Actors: Ray Wise, Adam Green, Will Barratt, Josh Ethier, Rileah Vanderbilt, Kane Hodder, Sarah Elbert, Tom Holland, Mick Garris, Alex Pardee, Jimmy McCarthy, Nic Henley, Caitlyn Brisbin, Robert Pendergraft
IMDb: www.imdb.com/title/tt1991031/
We are introduced to the YouTube channel Prankstaz.tv, run by two mildly sociopathic douchebags who make prankster-videos where they break into a morgue (among other things) and takes a selfie with one of the cadavers. And all just to see those precious views on YouTube. Reminds me of a certain guy with a similar channel who went to Suicide Forest in Japan in late 2017, to film a fresh corpse hanging from a tree and laugh at it and mock it afterwards. So, here we get a satirical glimpse at how toxic and obnoxious the YouTube prankster-community can be, and how far they are willing to push the shock factor to get the desired attention and views.
“Hell House LLC” starts with some news-clips where we learn that an abandoned hotel, which has been transformed into a haunted house tour in a small town outside New York, ended in disaster on 8th October 2009. Several people were killed and injured, and nobody knows what really happened, but the police vaguely blames the outburst on a major malfunction. With the suspicion that the police are holding back some info from the public, it creates conspiracy theories among some local journalists who starts their own investigation. They get in contact with one of Hell House’s crew members, Sarah, who gives them all the raw footage that documents the whole process which spans from August 23rd to October 8th. When she is asked why she hasn’t turned this over to the police, she simply says “you’ll see”. Alright, so let’s take a look.
Grave Encounters is a “found footage” horror movie about a reality TV series where three paranormal investigators visists historic haunted landmarks in the United States, like we’ve seen in “Ghost Hunters”, “Ghost Adventures” and numerous more of these shows that’s exploded in the recent ten years. But “Grave Encounters” was ahead of its time, according to what a producer tells us in the introduction before the movie starts. The film revolves around the sixth episode of “Grave Encounters” where the entire crew were to inspect an abondened haunted asylum where they disappeared and were never seen again. The only thing that was found was the 70-hour raw footage trimmed down to the last episode. And the producer that introduces us to the episode also tells us that what we’re about to watch is real, has not been tampered with, and just been edited strictly to cut down the time.