Willow Creek
Director: Bobcat Goldthwait
Writer: Bobcat Goldthwait
Cast: Alexie Gilmore, Bryce Johnson
Part of: /slash Filmfestival

Plot:
Jim (Bryce Johnson) is a huge bigfoot fan. So his girlfriend Kelly (Alexie Gilmore) agrees to go to Willow Creek with him, the site where the famous bigfoot footage was shot in the 70s. They want to hike out to the exact same spot and see if they can find bigfoot on their own. All the locals warn them to stay away but their hearts are set. Which is something they regret quickly.

I have said it many times: I’m not a fan of found footage. But you can barely escape it nowadays and so I’ve seen my fair share. And from those, Willow Creek catapulted itself pretty much to the top of my list. It hits all the right notes for me: It’s charming, it’s funny, it’s tense and it’s scary.

This film really surprised me. I didn’t expect to like it much at all but I ended up really loving it. And there are many reasons for that. One, Goldthwait takes his time with both the settings and the characters. The first half is practically a documentary Jim and Kelly shoot about Willow Creek (which is an actual town that actually lives off the bigfoot thing), showing us interviews with the residents and exploring the bigfoot marketing. And I honestly wouldn’t have minded watching an entire documentary about it.

That documentary part not only sets the scene and avoids the shaky cam annoyance, but gives us time to get to know – and like – Jim and Kelly. They were so cute together and I really took a shine to them. Absolute adorableness. And since I cared so much about both of them and the format (it is “found” footage after all, not “delivered” footage or “after extensive deliberation carefully put together” footage) made it pretty clear that it wouldn’t end well for them, the tension was instantly and automatically higher.

So, you got the perfect set-up for a horror film, but the movie’s coup de grace (to deliver me into movie goer heaven) is the perfect scene where Jim and Kelly are in a tent, in the middle of the night, in the middle of nowhere and they start to hear weird sounds. I nearly crapped my pants during that scene. The setting is creepy, Bryce Johnson and Alexie Gilmore are spot-on and it’s made even more delicious by the fact that it is a fucking long scene where the camera is stationary the entire time and there are no cuts. It was impressive as hell.

The ending had a bit of a what the fuck moment to it, but that just means that I’ll probably have to re-watch it to puzzle everything together. And I gladly will.

Summarizing: Even if you’re not into bigfoot or found footage or both, watch it.