We're mere days away from the second annual Unnamed Footage Festival and we're extremely excited about this year's lineup! UFF has grown so much in its short lifespan, and this year we will be having an opening night screening of last year's winner along with drinks and shmoozing Thursday night at the Artist's Television Access on Valencia Street. Then it's two solid days of found footage horror, faux documentary, and POV cinema at the Balboa Theatre!
We are also unveiling this year's festival trailer, you can find it at the end of this post. Enjoy!
💀 Thursday 💀
OPENING NIGHT RE-CALIBRATION PARTY AT ATA
BUTTERFLY KISSES [2018.USA.1h31m]
Thursday 21st @ 8pm
BUTTERFLY KISSES is a documentary about a documentary, burying a ghost story in a unique frame, with the BUTTERFLY KISSES director [Erik Kristopher Myers] himself investigating its authenticity. The film follows, Gavin York, an aspiring filmmaker who has made the most important discovery of his life: a box of old tapes. These tapes contain raw, unedited footage shot by two young students concerning the local legend, Peeping Tom. As the story of this footage unravels, so does Gavin, and a documentary crew he has recruited to film everything is there to capture what may or may not be a supernatural phenomenon. - MK
💀 Friday 💀
PARANORMAL ACTIVITY 2: TOKYO NIGHT [2010.Japan.1h30m]
Friday 22nd @ 12pm
A Japanese student is struck by a car while visiting San Diego and is returning home after her accident with two broken legs — and an unexpected guest. Released a year after America's J-horror craze came to an end, TOKYO NIGHT is a direct sequel to 2007's PARANORMAL ACTIVITY, made in Japan and never released in the USA. Don't miss this rare opportunity to see an American ghost story filtered through another culture. - RF
💀 Short Form Footage #1 💀
Friday 22nd @ 1:45pm
MIDNIGHT SWIM [2015.USA.1h24m]
Friday 22nd @ 3:45pm
Three half sisters return to their childhood home to settle their mother’s affairs after she is pronounced dead following a diving accident, from which her body was never recovered. After getting reacquainted with the surroundings they left behind and learning of local legends that surround the lake in which their mother perished, the sisters jokingly perform a summoning ritual on the pier by the house. The already heavy atmosphere is then peppered with strange occurrences that none of the women can explain, while they are each developing a vastly different relationship with the lake. Sarah Adina Smith’s directorial debut THE MIDNIGHT SWIM takes a subtle approach to horror while drowning the audience in the emotional turmoil of a strained family relationship. -OO
[Screening w/ short THE LAST VACATION]
NIGHT TRIP [1993.USA.1h12m]
Friday 22nd @ 5:25pm
A documentarian joins a taxi driver on a late night journey into the bizzaro landscape of Eugene, Oregon in 1993. Completed two years prior to the rise of Taxicab Confessions, oddballs join the driver throughout the night, taking them on a strange odyssey. An artifact of the past, THE NIGHT TRIP remained unknown and undistributed, an unsettling expedition through a time that is both remembered and forgotten. Never before screened in a theater, UFF is excited to be the first to display this buried gem of early found footage. - CL
[Followed by Q&A with the filmmaker]
20th ANNIVERSARY: THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT [1999.USA.1h45m]
Friday 22nd @ 7:10pm
Written and Directed by Daniel Myrick & Eduardo Sánchez, Produced by Gregg Hale
Two decades ago three young filmmakers went into the woods to investigate a legend, and all that came back were a few reels of film. Was it real? At first, no one was sure. To maintain believability, the actors weren’t provided a script, merely a directive: keep filming. The filmmakers staged the horrors around them, and the actors had no idea what to expect. This documentation of real fear is what elevated THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT from another supernatural horror to the groundbreaking work that inspired hundreds of filmmakers to experiment in this style themselves. UFF is honored to be presenting this 20th anniversary screening of the watershed film that brought found footage horror to the mainstream. - MK
[THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT will include a video introduction from director Eduardo Sanchez and will be screened on VHS for full immersion.]
[ w/ short CULT FILM]
EL SANATORIO [2010.COSTA RICA.1hr13m]
Friday 22nd @ 9pm
El Sanatorio Duran was built in 1919, a sanitorium for tuberculosis patients. Over the years, the institute became a prison and an orphanage, where countless atrocities were committed. Kurt and Luis are two aimless students who decide to make a documentary about the abandoned sanitorium — and of course, things don’t go quite as planned. Collecting an odd cast of characters to accompany them on their journey, Costa Rica’s first ever horror film is a creative and disarmingly funny late-night crowd pleaser. - MK
LA LLORONA INVESTIGATION: HER CRY [2019.USA.1h17m]
Friday 22nd @ 10:30pm
Tina was given a daunting challenge: spend the night in a known Llorona hotspot while pledging her sorority. And Tina never returned. The crew of the television program "Paranormal Legends” has recovered the sorority's cameras and sees this as the perfect opportunity to kick start their shows 4th season, solve the mystery of the Llorona, a Latin American legend known as the “Weeping Woman”. And now, they've gone missing as well. Join UFF for the never before seen police re-cut of LA LLORONA INVESTIGATION, an absurdly over-the-top horror film that exemplifies how entertaining a committed and fearless cast can be. - RF
[Screening w/ short TOFINO 2018]
💀 Saturday 💀
💀 Short Form Footage #2 💀
WEBCAST [2016.UK.1h36m]
Saturday 23rd @ 12:45pm
While shooting a documentary about the disappearance of her aunt, Chloe and cameraman Ed catch something completely unexpected The filmmaking duo shift their focus to surveilling the seemingly vanilla old couple next door, uploading their findings to the internet every step of the way. Although their story goes unnoticed, documenting becomes a compulsion, especially when they realize that the couple next door aren’t the only people with dark secrets in their basements. WEBCAST blends the invasive voyeurism of REAR WINDOW with the paranoia of ROSEMARY’S BABY, and still manages to blindside you with an explosive ending that will make you think twice about peeking into strangers’ windows. - OO
[Followed by Q&A with the filmmaker]
THE MOOSE HEAD OVER THE MANTEL [2018.USA.1h29m]
Saturday 23rd @ 2:45pm
1983: A young woman moves her family into her long-abandoned ancestral home. Though desperate to build a new life, they wind up caught in the maelstrom of violence and horror that has enveloped the house for more than a century. Six different directors capture the carnage over different time periods, all seen from the perspective of animal heads mounted and lurking on the living room wall. This found footage anthology builds smartly and powerfully to a painfully inevitable climax of all-out horror and carnage. - DR
[Screening w/ short HOUND FOOTAGE]
DRIB [2017.USA/Norway.1h28m]
Saturday 23rd @ 4:45pm
A viral video star gets the opportunity to be sponsored by a very popular, unnamed energy drink, but sometimes the reason why you get hired is the same reason you get fired. This innovative and underseen film is comprised of interviews and reenactments of Amir Asgharnejad’s real life story with internet fame colliding with a harsh critique of the marketing world. Including the talents of Adam Pearson [UNDER THE SKIN] and comedian Brett Gelman, DRIB is a sleek and imaginative documentary of half-truths that marries style and substance. - CL
ANTRUM: THE DEADLIEST FILM EVER MADE [2018.USA.1h35m]
Saturday 23rd @ 6:30pm
After spending decades lost in obscurity, the forbidden film ANTRUM has resurfaced. Shot in the early 1970s by an Eastern European filmmaker, ANTRUM tells the story of two children and their descent into hell. The making of the film is shrouded in mystery, but directors Laicini and Amito have pieced together what little history there is to tell the story of the cursed film and the tragedies it has unleashed. Now, those daring enough will finally have the chance to see ANTRUM: THE DEADLIEST FILM EVER MADE. - MK
[Followed by Q&A with the filmmakers]
FOLLOWED [2018.USA.1h36m]
Saturday 23rd @ 8:30pm
"Vlogger of the Macabre," DropTheMike made a name for himself by disrespecting the dead and exploiting urban legends. For his next episode he recruits three friends for a special Halloween-edition vlog. They'll be staying inside the reputably haunted Hotel Lennox, in an attempt to gain 50,000 more subscribers and the $250,000 promised by "Haute Gothic" in return. Mixing the upbeat vibe of an overproduced vlog with the narrative stylings of UNFRIENDED, FOLLOWED will please both casual and serious Found Footage horror fans. - RF
[Followed by Q&A with cast and crew]
MURDER BOX [2018.Canada.1h22m]
Saturday 23rd @ 10:30pm
A stand-up comedian with a penchant for the macabre is questioned by local authorities after his ex-girlfriend brings his morality and sanity into question with a video diary. Inspired by Gerald Varga’s stage persona, Gerald Gerald Geraldson, MURDER BOX is a dissection of the delusion of an artist and how far is too far for a laugh. - CL
[WORLD PREMIERE. Gerald Gerald Geraldson will be joining us in person for a set of his unique stand up comedy and a Q&A following the film.]
You can find all these times and titles in our exclusive festival trailer!
Get tickets at UnnamedFootageFestival.com
