"The Outwaters" follows a group of hip thirty-somethings who venture into the Mojave Desert to film a music video for one of them, who is a singer. To put it mildly, things don't go as planned.
This highly-touted independent found footage effort by first-time director/writer/actor Robbie Banfitch is one that had been on my radar since its first release. The highly polarizing reviews piqued my interest even further, but, after having seen it, I find myself favoring the elements of the film that others have cited as failures.
Taking heavy cues from "The Blair Witch Project", the film has a languorous buildup that seems to be a main point of criticism from the film's detractors. This is actually the portion of the film I found the most effective, even though there is little in the way of action. The first hour consists of snippets into the characters' lives, family dynamics, and an eventual travelogue as they make their way into the desert; these sequences have an immediacy to them that draws you in, and keeps you perfectly on a precipice--you know something bad is going to happen, but the threat looms quietly under the sun-drenched landscape. At times, there is an almost "Picnic at Hanging Rock" sensibility to the proceedings. The tone is overwhelmingly ominous.
Things ramp up as the campers find themselves hearing strange explosive noises surrounding their campsite one night, after which all hell breaks loose--and unfortunately, it is at this vital point where the action kicks in that I found the film takes a nosedive. After this, "The Outwaters" devolves into a repetitive series of vignettes, images, and motifs that are suggestive but feel strangely hollow. There are a few occasional haunting images here, but the art installation-esque visuals and sound design don't amount to much on a narrative level. As a purely sensory experience, it still runs thin with time.
The film ends on a horrifically gruesome note, but even the disturbing final moments of the film function as an inadequate bookend to its bombastic and meandering second half. Where "The Outwaters" succeeds best is its establishing sequences, which boast an intoxicating sense of threat and deliriousness. Unfortunately, once the lights start to flash and the viscera start to shred, the film implodes. 5/10.
This highly-touted independent found footage effort by first-time director/writer/actor Robbie Banfitch is one that had been on my radar since its first release. The highly polarizing reviews piqued my interest even further, but, after having seen it, I find myself favoring the elements of the film that others have cited as failures.
Taking heavy cues from "The Blair Witch Project", the film has a languorous buildup that seems to be a main point of criticism from the film's detractors. This is actually the portion of the film I found the most effective, even though there is little in the way of action. The first hour consists of snippets into the characters' lives, family dynamics, and an eventual travelogue as they make their way into the desert; these sequences have an immediacy to them that draws you in, and keeps you perfectly on a precipice--you know something bad is going to happen, but the threat looms quietly under the sun-drenched landscape. At times, there is an almost "Picnic at Hanging Rock" sensibility to the proceedings. The tone is overwhelmingly ominous.
Things ramp up as the campers find themselves hearing strange explosive noises surrounding their campsite one night, after which all hell breaks loose--and unfortunately, it is at this vital point where the action kicks in that I found the film takes a nosedive. After this, "The Outwaters" devolves into a repetitive series of vignettes, images, and motifs that are suggestive but feel strangely hollow. There are a few occasional haunting images here, but the art installation-esque visuals and sound design don't amount to much on a narrative level. As a purely sensory experience, it still runs thin with time.
The film ends on a horrifically gruesome note, but even the disturbing final moments of the film function as an inadequate bookend to its bombastic and meandering second half. Where "The Outwaters" succeeds best is its establishing sequences, which boast an intoxicating sense of threat and deliriousness. Unfortunately, once the lights start to flash and the viscera start to shred, the film implodes. 5/10.