Two Years After Its Launch, You Nonetheless Cannot Beat This Discovered Footage Film’s Visceral Depth
When it launched in theaters and on Screambox in 2023, probably the most spectacular factor about The Outwaters was that the movie was written, directed, produced, and edited by one particular person, Robbie Banfitch, who additionally stars within the movie. Nonetheless, what’s most spectacular now because the movie approaches its second anniversary is how properly The Outwaters holds up as probably the most visceral found-footage film, with the narrative, sound design, and cinematography combining to plunge the viewers right into a realm of confusion that matches what its characters are going by means of. The Outwaters makes use of an unorthodox method to storytelling and delivers a devastating payoff that ends in the lack of your entire forged of characters, with a physique depend similar to earlier entries within the found-footage style, corresponding to The Blair Witch Project.
The Outwaters follows 4 associates — Robbie (Banfitch), Angela (Angela Basolis), Michelle (Michelle Could), and Scott (Scott Schamell) — who enterprise into the Mojave Desert to shoot a music video for Michelle’s up-and-coming music profession. Their journey begins off regular however quickly turns into full chaos, because the group stumbles right into a disruption in space-time and encounters unnatural horrors lurking within the huge vacancy of the desert. As actuality warps and time bends repetitively, the foursome are subjected to more and more nightmarish occasions, together with watching their very own deaths play out on repeat.
‘The Outwaters’ Confronts Its Viewers
The Outwaters demonstrates the disorienting potential of found-footage to its full potential by using fragmented visuals by way of pieced-together memory-card footage and a climax that takes place virtually fully at night time, usually with solely a flashlight offering glimpses of disturbing photos. The sound design is simply as unrelenting, because the movie’s soundscape affords ear-piercing shrieks, distant rumblings, distorted echoes, and unnatural noises that do the vast majority of the work when it comes to each setting the ambiance for the movie and guaranteeing its viewers feels suffocated by the expanse of the Mojave and the cosmos.
By way of its narrative, The Outwaters does not construct towards the torment its core forged of 4 will face all through its runtime in conventional storytelling fashion. As a substitute, the movie collapses in on itself and plunges right into a chaotic actuality the place house and time appear to be coming aside Donnie Darko-style. And, simply because the Mojave Desert seems to be calm because the characters start their journey there, the story does require some endurance from the viewers earlier than the movie reaches the place chaos is totally unleashed. However, as soon as it will get there, The Outwaters feels inescapable. This distinctive method to progressing the narrative works within the movie’s favor, because it immerses its viewers within the insanity. Making an attempt to observe the timelines and every subsequent shift within the universe calls for one’s full consideration, and making an attempt to decipher precisely what is definitely occurring within the movie solely attracts you additional into the story.
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Robbie Banfitch’s Cosmic Nightmare within the Desert
As soon as The Outwaters actually takes off — and its characters are pressured to endure changing into untethered from time and house — what audiences see is a non-linear sequence of occasions the place the characters exist between dimensions. The result’s the continuous interruption of the method of dying, because the viewers witnesses Robbie, Angela, Scott, and Michelle caught in a loop and seemingly endless torment. In a approach, no matter tear in house the 4 have stumbled upon turns into their private hell, with their very own deaths continuously interrupted and repeated to them. It isn’t sufficient for the group to must face terrifying, shrieking worm-like creatures within the desert or to look at the sky open up — the characters must be energetic contributors in their very own horrors. Because the characters watch their very own deaths happen and expertise them on repeat, it turns into clear that one in all their very own, pushed mad by previous and future experiences, is probably going the reason for the group’s struggling.
The conclusion to The Outwaters isn’t actually as finite because it appears, as there are nonetheless many lingering questions by the point credit roll: What’s inflicting this disturbance in space-time? What’s the unknowable power that’s consuming actuality? And, lastly, are the characters nonetheless trapped in a loop, with the story carrying on previous what the viewers is ready to see? The one certainty is that there is no such thing as a sense of aid when The Outwaters reaches its ending — solely confusion and lingering misery.
The Outwaters has largely flown below the radar since its launch, however those that have seen it may possibly attest to the unsettling, immersive expertise it affords. Its atmospheric journey through the cosmos goes towards conventional storytelling methods to create one of the uncooked and intense movie-watching experiences the found-footage style can provide. As a result of, finally, it is not a film you watch — it is a film you endure.
