This movie deserves a lot of praise and recognition for being such an original one and taking such a great approach. However the movie sort of becomes a victim of its own approach as well.
It's not really your typical horror-flick. It basically is being a fake-documentary, or mockumentary better said, that follows the events and the persons involved with a young girls drowning. Supernatural elements are present but the movie never abandons its documentary like approach. It all gets strengthens by some 'amateur shot footage' and pictures that get inserted into the movie.
This is really the movie its biggest strength. It makes the story and its characters feel all very real. Occensionaly the movie will give you an uncomfortable feeling because of the events occurring and the realistic documentary like approach of it all. In that regard this movie is being way more effective than any other kind of horror movie, dealing with the paranormal.
What also really helps the movie is its acting. At least the main leads are very convincing in their roles. They let the movie really feel like a documentary at times, since they look like a real grieving family. Its part of what often makes the movie often so uncomfortable to watch.
However, as you'll soon start to realize, a movie with this kind of approach can only be that interesting for that long. After a while you are really starting to loose some of your interest with this movie. Its like the film-makers realized this as well, while still working on the script. To keep things interesting and going, they put in several twists. All nice and well but it sort of takes away some of the movie its credibility. On top of that it lets the movie look kind of lazy, since it doesn't always explain all of the mystery and questions that the movie its story will leave you with. It turns into one direction but then it will suddenly turn into a complete other again. This way lots of the movie its answers and mystery are being left unexplained, which is unsatisfying. It only leaves you with more questions. It seems like they put it purely into the movie to keep it all going and to keep it interesting, without worrying about it making a significant addition to the movie its story and mystery. It wants to fool you a couple of times but instead only mostly fools itself. The movie and its story suffered really from this and is the reason why I still can't really regard this movie as being a truly great one, that you'll need to see.
A shame, since the movie is still a real accomplishment. It's a low budget movie, made with limited resources and some still inexperienced people, behind the camera. With its original style of approach the movie deserved to be really eventually a better one. Still this movie must have attracted some attention, since a remake is currently in the making, with some of the same people involved. It means they probably get an higher budget to spend this time and also get some more exposure for their movie. Who knows, the movie might also turn out to be a better one as well. Lets hope they've learned from some of their mistakes and find another way around them, without throwing out but by still maintaining the movie its stronger points and elements, that still help to keep this movie an interesting and original watch.
6/10
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