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Unfriended Films (Leo Gabriadze/Stephen Susco, 2015/2018)
Posted: Tue Jun 07, 2016 2:31 am
by mfunk9786
Flipping channels this evening, I stumbled upon what initially seemed to be one of the more loathsome film concepts I'd ever seen - I was watching a bunch of teenagers having a benign Skype chat, with the lead character flipping through her browser, a bunch of open clothes shopping tabs - but I couldn't turn it off. As Unfriended played out, though, it struck me as a really brave sort of cinematic anarchy, entirely eschewing any traditional visual film language, playing the entire story straight from one computer screen. And it's an authentic computer screen - so many films and television shows get the ins and outs of what an actual functioning real life computer looks like, moves like, has littered throughout it - but a lot of care clearly went into avoiding awkward moments of "oh, that wouldn't look like that/function like that/be called that" that could've tanked this concept on arrival.
The subject matter is vital and maybe a little too serious for a high concept horror film that ends with an icky, slick music cue - but everything is played nightmarishly straight for the majority of its runtime. These characters are awful and there's zero reason to root for any of them, feel sympathy for any of them (and I think the mind games and violation at play could've been fleshed out even more, to boot) so I'm not sure how successful it is as a narrative, but I'd highly recommend it merely because you've never seen anything like it before.
Re: The Films of 2015
Posted: Tue Jun 07, 2016 7:02 am
by Red Screamer
mfunk9786 wrote:The subject matter is vital and maybe a little too serious for a high concept horror film that ends with an icky, slick music cue
I remember hearing that the ending was forced onto the film by producers or something. Does anyone have the story on this?
Re: The Films of 2015
Posted: Tue Jun 07, 2016 3:09 pm
by cdnchris
mfunk9786 wrote:Flipping channels this evening, I stumbled upon what initially seemed to be one of the more loathsome film concepts I'd ever seen - I was watching a bunch of teenagers having an initially benign Skype chat, with the lead character flipping through her browser, a bunch of open clothes shopping tabs - but I couldn't turn it off. As Unfriended played out, though, it struck me as a really brave sort of cinematic anarchy, entirely eschewing any traditional visual film language, playing the entire story straight from one computer screen. And it's an authentic computer screen - so many films and television shows get the ins and outs of what an actual functioning real life computer looks like, moves like, has littered throughout it - but a lot of care clearly went into avoiding awkward moments of "oh, that wouldn't look like that/function like that/be called that" that could've tanked this concept on arrival.
The subject matter is vital and maybe a little too serious for a high concept horror film that ends with an icky, slick music cue - but everything is played nightmarishly straight for the majority of its runtime. These characters are awful and there's zero reason to root for any of them, feel sympathy for any of them (and I think the mind games and violation at play could've been fleshed out even more, to boot) so I'm not sure how successful it is as a narrative, but I'd highly recommend it merely because you've never seen anything like it before.
I actually did like this one. My wife rented it from Red Box and I admittedly rolled my eyes but after a really rough start I found myself getting into this. Like you I was impressed especially at the level of detail that went into the computer's desktop and admired how it really stuck to this type of narrative, making use of the multiple Skype windows with the side IM (is it still called that?) conversations, so you'd see one thing going on but then get something else important fed to you from somewhere else. Yeah, it was a bit clunky in the narrative but once I saw where it was going I was more willing to give it a chance and I'm glad I did. The ending is cheap, but I was expecting it since that seems to be the go-to for horror films aimed at teenagers, and this was completely marketed to them. But yes, all of its characters are particularly despicable and its hard to feel sympathy for any of them, though I don't think you're supposed to
and it does get sympathy out of you towards the victim, who I assume is the demonic force at the center of all of this, so there is at least that.
Re: Unfriended (Leo Gabriadze, 2015)
Posted: Tue Jun 07, 2016 3:59 pm
by mfunk9786
Also worth noting: I can't remember the last time I saw a film that I sincerely liked that left me with less enthusiasm for whatever the director does next. It's a really unique visual presentation, but it's something that doesn't directly translate to "this director has X, Y, and Z in his arsenal" in my mind's eye because I've never really seen anything like it, and because I'm not sure that a 46 year old Georgian director who made a movie that entirely takes place on a teenager's Mac screen has a ton of prospects in the eyes of financiers.
Superswede11 wrote:mfunk9786 wrote:The subject matter is vital and maybe a little too serious for a high concept horror film that ends with an icky, slick music cue
I remember hearing that the ending was forced onto the film by producers or something. Does anyone have the story on this?
There are an absurd 113 IMDB trivia items for this film for some reason, so if there's something like this that took place, it's probably covered there
Re: Unfriended (Leo Gabriadze, 2015)
Posted: Tue Jun 07, 2016 4:23 pm
by Emak-Bakia
I caught this film in the theater when it first came out, and, while I would consider it a failure by most standards, I think that, in, say, 20 years it could become an interesting historical document of the aesthetic of the internet at a particular time. For now, since we currently live that aesthetic everyday, the visuals are rather mundane to contemporary audiences.
Re: Unfriended (Leo Gabriadze, 2015)
Posted: Tue Jun 07, 2016 5:47 pm
by beamish13
mfunk9786 wrote:
There are an absurd 113 IMDB trivia items for this film for some reason, so if there's something like this that took place, it's probably covered there
That's hilarious. I love how comically obtuse and mundane many of the items on IMDB trivia pages have become in recent years.
Re: Unfriended (Leo Gabriadze, 2015)
Posted: Tue Jun 07, 2016 7:03 pm
by thirtyframesasecond
There seemed to be a few of these movies around at the same time - is this the one where
someone defriends a weird girl so she kills all their friends until she's the last one
Actually that might've been Friend Request now that I think about it.
I try to remember what I was watching in the cinema to get these kind of trailers. Reckon it must've been The Witch.
Fear of the Internet horrors seem a bit out of date - Japan was doing these at the Millennium.
Re: Unfriended (Leo Gabriadze, 2015)
Posted: Tue Jun 07, 2016 7:24 pm
by mfunk9786
This came out in the first half of 2015, so I doubt you were seeing trailers for it before The Witch. Other than that, maybe you want to take a second to look it up and refresh your memory - but if your point (as it seems to be) is that this film is wholly unoriginal, I think you're barking up the wrong tree, especially if you're going to try to make the argument hold up without having seen the film.
Re: Unfriended (Leo Gabriadze, 2015)
Posted: Tue Jun 07, 2016 8:36 pm
by thirtyframesasecond
mfunk9786 wrote:This came out in the first half of 2015, so I doubt you were seeing trailers for it before The Witch. Other than that, maybe you want to take a second to look it up and refresh your memory - but if your point (as it seems to be) is that this film is wholly unoriginal, I think you're barking up the wrong tree, especially if you're going to try to make the argument hold up without having seen the film.
It was Friend Request that I saw the trailer for - I don't think I've seen/read anything about Unfriended. My mistake.
Re: Unfriended (Leo Gabriadze, 2015)
Posted: Thu Jun 09, 2016 12:31 pm
by barryconvex
there is also a movie called The Den that i recall being a Skype chat between multiple characters from a couple years before Unfriended. if i remember correctly The Den takes place entirely from the computer's POV but it's just one main character calling different people...
Re: Unfriended (Leo Gabriadze, 2015)
Posted: Sat Mar 10, 2018 9:10 pm
by domino harvey
Blumhouse greenlit a secret sequel,
Unfriended: Dark Web, which had its
surprise premiere at SXSW
Re: Unfriended (Leo Gabriadze, 2015)
Posted: Sun Mar 11, 2018 9:39 am
by Lost Highway
barryconvex wrote:there is also a movie called The Den that i recall being a Skype chat between multiple characters from a couple years before Unfriended. if i remember correctly The Den takes place entirely from the computer's POV but it's just one main character calling different people...
Yup, I actually preferred this to Unfriended. The fist horror film I can remember using this device was the Joe Swanberg segment in the first VHS anthology film.
Re: Unfriended Films (Leo Gabriadze/Stephen Susco, 2015/2018
Posted: Sun Mar 11, 2018 11:56 am
by CSM126
Unfriended getting a sequel is proof people will watch literally anything. I don’t know how anyone watched the first one and came away saying “please, bore me again. I love static shots of computer monitors!”.
Re: Unfriended Films (Leo Gabriadze/Stephen Susco, 2015/2018
Posted: Sun Mar 11, 2018 12:06 pm
by Lost Highway
CSM126 wrote:Unfriended getting a sequel is proof people will watch literally anything. I don’t know how anyone watched the first one and came away saying “please, bore me again. I love static shots of computer monitors!”.
Not to suggest that Unfriended or The Den are anywhere near Hitchcock but that’s like saying "why would anyone watch James Steward looking at windows in his back yard ? ". Of course it’s not about the monitor but what is on it. There is a long tradition of thrillers setting themselves challenges about confined spaces and that’s a technological twist on that.
Re: Unfriended Films (Leo Gabriadze/Stephen Susco, 2015/2018
Posted: Sun Mar 11, 2018 1:43 pm
by Robin Davies
Lost Highway wrote:Not to suggest that Unfriended or The Den are anywhere near Hitchcock but that’s like saying "why would anyone watch James Steward looking at widows in his back yard ? "
Depends how attractive the widows are.
Re: Unfriended Films (Leo Gabriadze/Stephen Susco, 2015/2018
Posted: Sun Mar 11, 2018 2:20 pm
by Lost Highway
Robin Davies wrote:Lost Highway wrote:Not to suggest that Unfriended or The Den are anywhere near Hitchcock but that’s like saying "why would anyone watch James Steward looking at widows in his back yard ? "
Depends how attractive the widows are.
Re: Unfriended Films (Leo Gabriadze/Stephen Susco, 2015/2018
Posted: Sun Mar 11, 2018 5:41 pm
by bearcuborg
I dug the inventiveness of the first one, which I caught on TV a few years ago. Perhaps being a film student/film fest judge I was able to appreciate its snazzy editing. The performances were perfectly underplayed.
Re: Unfriended Films (Leo Gabriadze/Stephen Susco, 2015/2018
Posted: Sun Mar 11, 2018 6:34 pm
by thirtyframesasecond
I think I did watch the first one. There seemed a spate of these types of films at once though, so it could've been a different one. J-Horror was doing this ages ago.
Re: Unfriended Films (Leo Gabriadze/Stephen Susco, 2015/2018
Posted: Sun Mar 11, 2018 7:02 pm
by Lost Highway
thirtyframesasecond wrote:J-Horror was doing this ages ago.
Which one ?
Re: Unfriended Films (Leo Gabriadze/Stephen Susco, 2015/2018
Posted: Sun Mar 11, 2018 8:59 pm
by thirtyframesasecond
Lost Highway wrote:thirtyframesasecond wrote:J-Horror was doing this ages ago.
Which one ?
Kiyoshi Kurosawa's Pulse from 2001?
Re: Unfriended Films (Leo Gabriadze/Stephen Susco, 2015/2018
Posted: Sun Mar 11, 2018 11:15 pm
by Lost Highway
thirtyframesasecond wrote:Lost Highway wrote:thirtyframesasecond wrote:J-Horror was doing this ages ago.
Which one ?
Kiyoshi Kurosawa's Pulse from 2001?
That dealt with the Internet as a subject matter but it didn’t use the aesthetic of social media, limiting itself only to what can only be seen on a laptop screen. Pulse was a conventionally shot film. Unfriended and The Den came out of the found footage subgenre, taking it one step further.
Re: Unfriended Films (Leo Gabriadze/Stephen Susco, 2015/2018)
Posted: Mon Jul 16, 2018 4:20 am
by DarkImbecile
Re: Unfriended Films (Leo Gabriadze/Stephen Susco, 2015/2018)
Posted: Mon Jul 16, 2018 6:25 am
by mfunk9786
That's a really neat idea considering the bizarre idea behind these films to begin with.
Re: Unfriended Films (Leo Gabriadze/Stephen Susco, 2015/2018)
Posted: Mon Jul 16, 2018 7:26 am
by black&huge
I must admit i enjoyed the first for what it is and this new ending gimmick is well... a good way to get me to see it.
Re: Unfriended Films (Leo Gabriadze/Stephen Susco, 2015/2018)
Posted: Mon Jul 16, 2018 2:57 pm
by domino harvey
Clue did it first, and it had three endings!