9 Found Footage Fates Worse Than Death

6. Lake Mungo - That Feeling Of Regretful Helplessness

Megan Is Missing
Arclight FIlms

2008 Australian found footage picture, Lake Mungo, is a film that maybe doesn't get quite the love it deserves.

It's not that people watch Lake Mungo and lambast it; it's more than this is a movie that has gone under the radar of more casual horror fans. Joel Anderson's film is a brilliant example of how to make a found footage flick connect to an audience.

The premise of Lake Mungo centres on a family struggling to deal with the death of their daughter. While the film is every inch a horror movie - with supernatural elements coming to the fore as the tale unravels - it's also a tale, first and foremost, of grief and dealing with loss. In that regard, it's haunting in more ways than merely the obvious.

Alice is the daughter here, with the troubled teen seeking medical advice after feeling something awful is going to happen to her.

From there, the audience sees a grainy phone recording of Alice confronted by a drowned, bloated version of herself. While it's heartbreaking to see that Alice had a premonition of her own demise, there's an additional level of heartache at seeing how regretful her family are that they were unable to help the youngster during her greatest time of need.

Adding a further blow, Alice's family also uncover a video recording of their 16-year daughter engaged in a sexual encounter with their husband-and-wife neighbours.

Senior Writer
Senior Writer

Once described as the Swiss Army Knife of WhatCulture, Andrew can usually be found writing, editing, or presenting on a wide range of topics. As a lifelong wrestling fan, horror obsessive, and comic book nerd, he's been covering those topics professionally as far back as 2010. In addition to his current WhatCulture role of Senior Content Producer, Andrew previously spent nearly a decade as Online Editor and Lead Writer for the world's longest-running genre publication, Starburst Magazine, and his work has also been featured on BBC, TechRadar, Tom's Guide, WhatToWatch, Sportkskeeda, and various other outlets, in addition to being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic. Between his main dayjob, his role as the lead panel host of Wales Comic Con, and his gig as a pre-match host for Wrexham AFC games, Andrew has also carried out a hugely varied amount of interviews, from the likes of Robert Englund, Kane Hodder, Adrienne Barbeau, Rob Zombie, Katharine Isabelle, Leigh Whannell, Bruce Campbell, and Tony Todd, to Kevin Smith, Ron Perlman, Elijah Wood, Giancarlo Esposito, Simon Pegg, Charlie Cox, the Russo Brothers, and Brian Blessed, to Kevin Conroy, Paul Dini, Tara Strong, Will Friedle, Burt Ward, Andrea Romano, Frank Miller, and Rob Liefeld, to Bret Hart, Sting, Mick Foley, Ricky Starks, Jamie Hayer, Britt Baker, Eric Bischoff, and William Regal, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, Brian Flynn, Denis Smith, Gary Bennett, Karl Connolly, and Bryan Robson - and that's just the tip of an ever-expanding iceberg.