Potentially, this film could have been a seriously disturbing flick. The reason it failed in my eyes wasn't because of the hand-held cam, it wasn't even that the acting was extremely dreadful, as it was in fact acceptable enough. When taking on a subject like this, there should be one major goal in the filmmakers minds of the utmost importance, make the story as realistic & believable as possible no matter what the cost, this just didn't occur.
The story consists of three social outcast nerds who, after years of abuse & bullying, decide it's time to stand up & turn the tables on one particular bully named Dax. It's the summer before their senior year and they feel as though maybe, if done correctly, this prank will redeem them in the eyes of their fellow classmates and possibly win the affection of a certain girl who one of them happens to have a crush on. Of course all of this is to be filmed & posted on the internet in hopes of a colossal payday which will finance the other boy's dream of hitting thirteen Star Trek conventions in a row, yes, lame indeed. Which brings me to another area of the film in which I felt was just lazy & completely unimaginative, the cardboard, cookie-cutter characters of the three nerds. They adhered to making them the most clichéd bunch of geeks ever concocted. Which was ultimately forgivable when looking at the big picture and the overall effect in which they were sequentially reaching for, to make the viewer uncomfortable, unsettled and inherently disturbed. A goal that was just not met.
I won't go into specifics of the plot that I felt led to the overall downfall of the film's believability, but I will say that the prank within a prank was not concealed well, it was completely obvious to me and it crippled the film's credibility beyond repair. The plot became completely disjointed & ultimately contradicted the premise set forth in the beginning. I know what they were reaching for here because I've seen it accomplished in other films quite well, where the viewer becomes immersed into the story and is left shocked & disturbed at the film's end because it was in fact so believable, not so in this case. I don't recommend wasting your time with this.
The story consists of three social outcast nerds who, after years of abuse & bullying, decide it's time to stand up & turn the tables on one particular bully named Dax. It's the summer before their senior year and they feel as though maybe, if done correctly, this prank will redeem them in the eyes of their fellow classmates and possibly win the affection of a certain girl who one of them happens to have a crush on. Of course all of this is to be filmed & posted on the internet in hopes of a colossal payday which will finance the other boy's dream of hitting thirteen Star Trek conventions in a row, yes, lame indeed. Which brings me to another area of the film in which I felt was just lazy & completely unimaginative, the cardboard, cookie-cutter characters of the three nerds. They adhered to making them the most clichéd bunch of geeks ever concocted. Which was ultimately forgivable when looking at the big picture and the overall effect in which they were sequentially reaching for, to make the viewer uncomfortable, unsettled and inherently disturbed. A goal that was just not met.
I won't go into specifics of the plot that I felt led to the overall downfall of the film's believability, but I will say that the prank within a prank was not concealed well, it was completely obvious to me and it crippled the film's credibility beyond repair. The plot became completely disjointed & ultimately contradicted the premise set forth in the beginning. I know what they were reaching for here because I've seen it accomplished in other films quite well, where the viewer becomes immersed into the story and is left shocked & disturbed at the film's end because it was in fact so believable, not so in this case. I don't recommend wasting your time with this.