John Erick Dowdle's unjustly shelved The Poughkeepsie Tapes is not torture porn. It's a terrifying faux documentary that forces you to contemplate the mind of a serial killer. The found footage "genre" has been done. But this film takes it one step further. Instead of playing the found footage ala [Rec] or The Blair
Witch Project, The Poughkeepsie Tapes brings in the reactions of FBI officials, relatives of the victims, psycho analysts, and the like who talk about how the found footage has affected them, and how much thought, patience, cunning, determination, and sheer joy the killer put into his murders. This is not a film for everyone. The way the interviewed describe what is on the found tapes is unsettling. But then, you're forced to watch parts of the tapes. While the build up is scarier than the pay off, both are effective nevertheless. My main complaint is that the script tries to make this serial killer like Jigsaw, which means he's too perfect at what he does. The man has thought out every angle and much to his own satisfaction, he toys with the police. This makes the movie quite predictable. But at the same time, I think the film isn't about how the movie ends. It's an experience that the filmmakers want you to go on, an experience into the most depraved human being civilized society could know.
August 10, 2011
