After a near-death drowning accident, a young boy's family is horrified to discover he has become possessed by a legendary demon from the depths of the lake. As the family races against time to save the boy's soul, the evil monster inside the child tears the family apart as it seeks to destroy everyone in its path.
Pablo Absento Dzhanik Fayziev Aleksandr Fomin Ben McKenzie Timur Bekmambetov Gilles Sousa Marie Garrett Mariya Zatulovskaya Mitch Davis Anna Shalashina Hiroko Oda
USAR
American Samoa
Guam
Northern Mariana Islands
Puerto RicoR
US Virgin IslandsR
USAR
American Samoa
Guam
Northern Mariana Islands
Puerto Rico
US Virgin Islands
USA
"Does your son have a sudden love for cucumbers?"
WARNING! Check out for people who eat cucumbers, are surrounded by insects, or are attracted to fresh water because they may be terrible monsters! Frogman and Gollum had a baby and he now has his own bloated folklore tech thriller movie.
The concept isn't bad, I liked the intrigue at the start and the folklore is a good idea but the execution is terrible. The online conversations are odd, it's like everything was pre-recorded separately and stitched together unnaturally. Video calls get edited in real time which makes no sense. They zoom in on stuff way too much, I don't think i've ever been that close to letters in my life…
💻 Both "Missing" and "Searching" are definitely in my top 100 favorite movies ever. So, when they announced that a part of the team was making a comparable movie, but with a horror theme, I was very excited. While it does not reach the same level, I still had a somewhat good time! The story was pretty simple; they gave the lead a very straightforward access to cameras and phones in Tokyo. However, they still did some very cool things with the concept of only showing everything that is on his computer screen, and that formula will never get old for me!
The actors were really good, especially Ben McKenzie, and the actors who played his kids were great as…
There's a joke somewhere about the title of this film and how it starts strong but falls apart by the end. It's an easy one too... this screen life flick is awfully... bloated. Har-de-har-har.
Anyhow, Bloat is about a military man who has to stay on duty as his wife and two sons vacation in Japan. When his youngest almost drowns, the kid turns... weird. The dad has to figure out what's going on from half-way across the world using only his various screens and apps.
I thought the first half of this film was pretty cool. It plays well with its themes of distance and the inability to be a proper husband and father when stationed on the other…
Bleh.
Searching and Missing this is not.
3rd time is not the charm for this "found computer(?) Film
There's a couple of Easter eggs in this that are run if you've follow the team behind this. 😉 but this was just executed terribly, the acting is choppy (no pun intended) the lore is cool but it's throw out the window for cheap jump scares, and horrible dialouge.
No one is likable in this movie, in Searching it's a father looking for his daughter, in missing it's a daughter looking for her mother...
And in Bloat...it's a bloated mess of a family, with an alcoholic father with no redemptive qualities trying to save his son so nonchalantly that you never fear or worry for anyone. No one makes smart decisions in this movie or behind this movie.
No Kappa.
The dad called just to say where the fuck are you
Wow… it’s awful.
This movie is boring as all hell. It’s a husband stationed in turkey, a wife and two sons in Japan, and all they do is argue while the younger son eats cucumbers. It’s just went on and on, and it’s only a 1hr 26min movie included credits.
This is described as a found footage horror, but found footage isn’t the right term for this as it’s actually a screenlife horror like Unfriended. There is a lot of static effect used through this to give the impression of bad connection and it’s horribly distracting as it’s hard to make out what characters are saying when the audio gets scrambled. It’s unwatchable at times because of this. I’m also…
about 30 minutes in, a scene reveals that this movie canonically takes place in the same universe as unfriended (2014) and i don’t know if you guys realize how hilarious this is. it means that at least one person somewhere actually enjoyed unfriended (2014)
This had all the makings of a great screen-life horror—solid production value, a promising setup, and decent performances from the cast. But unfortunately, it just couldn't stick the landing. The first half does a good job building intrigue, with eerie glitches and unsettling moments that hint at something sinister lurking beneath the surface. However, as the story progresses, the plot starts to unravel with glaring holes and confusing logic that take you out of the experience. Some key moments don't really make sense, and by the time the climax hits, it feels like the film has lost its way entirely. One of the biggest letdowns was the horror itself. The scares felt weak, and the fragmented visuals made it nearly…
Don’t tell Zuckerberg there’s a 10 year old with an Instagram account…
I love the screen life and found footage genre but even that love can be tested. Despite a short running time, Bloat feels long. Probably because NOTHING happens or when it does, it’s obscured in digital artifacts to make it indecipherable. I’m pretty sure AI was used to generate a fair amount of video here too (tsk tsk).
I’d be willing to look over the gaps in logic, like an enlisted officer webcamming during military drone operations or a dad buying his 10-year old a $700 gadget for his birthday if the movie brought the creeps. But it doesn’t. And because the footage has no teeth, everything is amped up with sound effects and background music to elicit a jump scare. Really terrible.
I’m a big fan of screenlife movies, and tend to enjoy them even when they’re not great. And yeah, this isn’t great. It’s a mess of ideas, where only some of them are followed through, and it breaks from the screenlife framework inexplicably. What makes the breaks from format most frustrating is that they do nothing to serve the plot. It’s also light on horror, despite being sold as such. Worst of all, for me at least, there are some very interesting elements presented that could have been built into a really interesting narrative. Instead, those elements are either completely inconsequential to the plot or only serve to build the aesthetic of the movie. The whole thing feels half-baked as…
