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Unfriended - Movie Review

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4 stars

It has been 16 years since The Blair Witch Project caught audiences off-guard with its creative use of previously recorded material in order to tell a story. The narrative style stuck, much to chagrin of critics and a few of my friends, and continues to be applied to various genres rather interestingly – even if, at times, it appears more gimmicky than it does fresh. And, to its credit, every single time someone suggests that the horror genre seems to be chained to an unmoving rock with the continued use of the “found footage” phenomenon, a movie comes along and unexpectedly frees it. Unfriended, with its blending of social media into the whole “found footage” mix, manages to serve up something entirely unique.

Log off and DIE. Yes, kiddos, it sounds like the mantra of today’s youth. Unfriended interprets the mantra rather literally. Instead of campgrounds, babysitting jobs, and lone cabins in the woods, Unfriended suggests all you need to truly experience terror is a wireless internet connection. And, in today’s “plugged in” society, I couldn’t agree more. Have YOU ever tried talking to these palm-piloted teens? The art of the conversation is most certainly lost on a lot of them. They wouldn’t know what to do at night around a fire pit, let alone with an acoustic guitar, and a wide open sky. Maybe panic. The sky is falling!  Who knows? The modern teen is a strange creature and some filmmakers know this.  Unfriended, rather smartly, adapts to the teenagers of today and invites them to join that Skype conference call…if they dare.

Written by Nelson Greaves, the film deals with a teenage girl’s suicide, Laura Barns (Heather Sossaman), after a very personal video is unleashed via social media for everyone to see. Her classmates - Blaire Lily (Shelley Hennig), Jess Felton (Renee Olstead), Val Rommel (Courtney Halverson), Ken Smith (Jacob Wysocki), Adam Sewell (Will Peltz), and Mitch Roussel (Moses Jacob Storm) – are engaged in a group conference call and start getting mysterious messages from an unknown participant. Turns out, they bullied the popular girl and have their fair share of guilt weighing on their minds. When the unknown person starts revealing their deepest, darkest secrets and fears, the group can’t help but wonder if this person is somehow connected to the girl they bullied. Is it her ghost who haunts their connection with these strange messages?

As ridiculous as it might sound, Unfriended is absolutely a relatable experience. If you’ve ever chatted, emailed, sent a text, or Skyped, you will more than likely be spooked by this flick. I found myself caught up in the drama due to my own experiences with harmless chats gone wrong or texts that seem to write themselves with words never typed. Damn you, autocorrect! The characters – as identifiable as the familiar glow put off from a MacBook screen – are neither irritating nor preposterous.

The film’s natural realism – which is key here – is compounded as the programs we all know; we all use and we all depend on, essentially, turn against us by making us tell more than we ever would in conversation. Social media doesn’t protect our secrets. Hell, it doesn’t even protect our interests. The film can read as a huge metaphor for the platform and that’s what is just so interestingly creepy about the film. Watch the world turn against you as these programs are seemingly possessed by an unseen force that demands to be fed with all of our secrets AND THEN RECOGNIZE YOURSELF IN IT ALL.

The acting is real, the situation is believable, and the script is actually clever. The experience of watching Unfriended is fairly innovative, too. It never bores. The events roll out as they transpire and, if one person logs off, someone in the chat will die. Greaves and the film’s director, Levan Gabriadze, work to deliver an engaging portrayal of bullying now that it, too, has gone cyber and has the potential to be an unending experience. They don’t shy away from this material at all and actually deliver a statement worthy of listening to.

Unfriended, rather shockingly, is one smart techno-horror flick guaranteed to have you rethinking the whole social media craze.

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Unfriended - Movie Review

MPAA Rating: R for violent content, pervasive language, some sexuality, and drug and alcohol use - all involving teens
Runtime:
82 mins
Director
: Levan Gabriadze
Writer: Nelson Greaves
Cast:
Heather Sossaman, Matthew Bohrer, Courtney Halverson
Genre
: Horror
Tagline:
This April, revenge comes online.
Memorable Movie Quote: "Who would hack into a dead girl's account?"
Distributor:
Universal Pictures
Official Site: http://www.unfriendedmovie.com/
Release Date:
April 17, 2015
DVD/Blu-ray Release Date:
No details available.
Synopsis: A group of online chat room friends find themselves haunted by a mysterious, supernatural force using the account of their dead friend.

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[tab title="Blu-ray Review"]

Unfriended - Blu-ray Review

Blu-ray

Blu-ray Details:

Available on Blu-ray - August 11, 2015
Screen Formats: 1.85:1
Subtitles
: English SDH
Audio:
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1
Discs: 50GB Blu-ray Disc'; Two-disc set (1 BD, 1 DVD); UV digital copy; Digital copy; DVD copy; BD-Live
Region Encoding: A

Added crispness and color to the found footage format is what you have here with Universal Studios Home Entertainment release of Unfriended. This 1080p transfer is super slick with a nicely detailed – computer screen pixels and all – presentation. My expectations were low due to the POV computer-screen presentation and this exceeded it nicely. Colors are strong and shadows are focused, too. The sound – presented here in a strong DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 lossless soundtrack – captures the real life video (with background noises and all) quite nicely.

Supplements:

Commentary:

  • None

Special Features:

None

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