Exists (2014)

The Blair Witch Project's Eduardo Sánchez uses his backwoods found footage expertise to direct Exists, a sasquatch tale. I don't know if this was intended, but within five minutes you will despise most of the characters. They are flimsy, juvenile caricatures. The upside is this a monster movie starring a vengeful, blood-hungry beast. With the use of impressive SFX makeup, stunt-work, and an appropriate buildup to the cryptid in question, Sánchez achieves a nice balance, never revealing too much. As much fun as it was to see the unsavory characters massacred, they truly ruin the film. There is not one member of the group I found myself rooting for. 

2 GoPros out of 5

V/H/S 2 [2013]

V/H/S 2's setup is pretty much exactly the same as the first in the anthology horror series, only this time around it's quite a bit more entertaining and tightly paced.
With The Raid: Redemption's Gareth Evans, Lovely Molly's Eduardo Sánchez and Hobo With A Shotgun's Jason Eisener on board as directors, you're pretty much guaranteed schlocky twisted fun.  It's not exactly high art and it's never particularly scary but it packs in enough laughs, gore and weirdness to end up being highly enjoyable.

3 doggy cams out of 5

LOVELY MOLLY [2011]

Eduardo Sánchez, director of The Blair Witch Project, sets out to creep us out again in Lovely Molly.

Carried by a particularly convincing performance from Gretchen Lodge, the film starts out like a run of the mill Paranormal Activity wannabe but slowly escalates into something far more weirder and unsettling.  I'm still not entirely sure what actually happened, partially due to far too many minor plotlines that had absolutely nothing to do with the bigger picture...I think.  Horses?  Deer?  Heroin?  Ghost rapes?  Your guess is as good as mine.  I really didn't expect anything at all with this film but was pleasantly surprised with frightened confusion and bizarre twists that might not mean anything at all.

3 painful kisses out of 5

The Blair Witch Project (1999)

Blair Witch is an incredibly challenging movie to rate, because watching it back in the 90s was a completely different experience than sitting down with it today. I vividly remember trying to reason why this movie couldn't be real as I tried to fall asleep, but it's not just that the movie's long been debunked. It's been aped so much since that it feels cliche where it once felt fresh, dull when it once was fascinating.

It hasn't stood the test of time, but there's a part of me that still likes it a lot. It feels more real than your average found footage film - maybe because it's so amateurish, but I like that authenticity. The camera work gives me a headache, but nostalgia or not, the movie still has its charms.

2.5 hanging stickmen out of 5.