Lake Mungo (2009)

I love paranormal programs and movies. This is a "mockumentary." It isn't scary. Maybe a little creepy but not scary. It was like watching any ghost hunting program with the exception of having the family conduct the investigation rather than an investigative team. It wasn't awful but I was a bit disappointed. I thought it could've been much more engaging.

It's extremely rare that I experience genuine chills as I did watching this film. An unsettling ghost story that doesn't rely on cheap jump scares or horror clichés, Lake Mungo is a welcome breath of fresh air to the genre. I'm disappointed in myself for not discovering it sooner and surprised that Hollywood hasn't got their grubby mitts on it yet for the inevitable remake. 10/10

This Australian picture is without a doubt a scary flick. It is a difficult movie to sell, because it doesn't work in conventional horror movie ethics like the popular horror movies nowadays, which make bank in 2017. And also "Paranormal Activity" is an easy comparison, because of its found footage approach, "Lake Mungo" is pretty different in what it's trying to accomplish. "Lake Mungo" depicts grief. Grief of parents, trying to figure out if or why her daughter suddenly died. Grief of the older brother, who's stuck with his mourning mom and dad. The scariness doesn't (only) lie within the supernatural, but mostly within the effect, such tragedies have on the family members. But the ones who like their ghost stories won't be disappointed, for there is some creepy home-video footage and very unsettling pixelated imagery. The movie doesn't tell you everything, so your mind will have to do the work, what makes the end product a lot more scary than over-explaining the background story or the mythology of something. I am someone who is easily frightened by a found footage movie. I love "The Blair Witch Project" and some "Paranormal Activity"-movies (especially the first one) and "Unfriended" and "Rec", because you are engaged in those movies in a very different way, than in conventional horror flicks. And "Lake Mungo" is a perfect addition to the found footage movies, who use the technique the right way. It uses all kinds of amateur formats, from camcorder to mobile-phone-camera and perfectly uses the low definition to create some of the most unsettling images you've seen. Sadly the audio suffers from the absolute dedication to only amateur and documentary filmmaking. The music and the background sound is always louder as the people speaking, which is not very pleasant and pretty disturbing (which should be a good thing in a horror movie). Also you really have to be in the mood for this movie and ready to let you creep out by low definition photographs and the unsettling meaning behind them, instead of demon faces and loud jump scares. If not, you could be annoyed or bored.But if you can ignore the very weak audio mixing and you can get into the experience, you're in for a treat. A very slow-burn horror story, with some very terrifying themes and haunting images.

This movie is very well made. Atmosphere, nuances, elements; all carefully considered to create realism and still have a psychological horror/thriller twist. I believe the closure the family gets at the end is from finding all possible evidence and none of it leading to them getting rid of their daughter/sister. It should be unsettling to the family that she was being warned by paranormal means and was taken away that way. They don't believe, then they believe because of the son playing tricks, then don't believe again, then at the end believe but it's OK (it was scary when they thought they were being haunted but not when it's haunting your family member to death). The mothers reaction to seeing her daughter in the room during the last psychic session and the daughters reaction to that is also revealing of some dark secret between them. The psychic notices this but is bound by not being able to prove his findings that the family is guilty; that's why that scene turns cold fast. When the family has exaggerated responses to people not telling them certain things or showing them; especially that those things didn't really help with the case says a lot. I can spend much time typing why I see that her family are the killers but re-watch it with that in mind. You'll see what I mean.