10 Hidden Horror Movie Gems Nobody Talks About
3. Afflicted
It's so incredibly difficult to do anything new or innovative in the found footage space, so it's a damn shame that Derek Lee and Clif Prowse's stunning 2013 entry Afflicted hasn't had more love over the last decade.
The film follows two best pals, Derek (Lee) and Clif (Prowse), as they travel the world and record a web series. But while in Barcelona, Derek becomes infected with a virus which causes him to manifest vampiric traits.
Besides how surprisingly few vampire-centric found footage movies there are, what sets Afflicted apart from other genre efforts is its jaw-dropping technical finesse.
Lee and Prowse clearly put a ton of work into delivering a found footage film that's not just full of shaky camerawork and played-out parlour tricks. Some of the camera movements in this movie - such as, at one point, having Lee take a perilous leap from a window to the ground - have a genuine "How the hell did they do that!?" quality given the film's mere $300,000 budget.
Between this and the genuine chemistry between the star-filmmakers, Afflicted remains an uncommonly smart and visceral stab at an overcrowded genre - and a maddeningly overlooked one.