10 Annoying Problems With Found Footage Movies

In the best found footage movies like the original Paranormal Activity, there’s a lot of buildup in the beginning that just makes it that much scarier when things go south. You need to establish some normality before the craziness starts, so these scenes make sense.

Yet many imitators (including the Paranormal Activity sequels) just take that way too far, with too much time in the first act dedicated to just completely useless filler scenes. The characters film themselves goofing around for giant stretches of time with the excuse being that if this footage was found on someone’s personal camcorder, a lot of the tape would be of them just doing their thing and hanging around.

And yeah, that’s true, but there’s only so much of this that the audience can take, especially when nearly half the movie is of no importance and is just annoying characters goofing off. When done well, the opening bits can really help establish these characters through seemingly meaningless footage, yet when done poorly, it just feels like the movie is completely wasting your time.