They're Watching

Last updated
They're Watching
They're Watching.jpg
Theatrical release poster
Directed by
Screenplay by
  • Jay Lender
  • Micah Wright
Produced by
  • Mark Lagrimas
  • Iuliana Tarnovetchi
Starring
Edited byBlake Barrie
Music byJonathan Wandag
Production
companies
  • Best Served Cold Productions
  • Warsong Entertainment
Distributed by Amplify
Release date
  • March 25, 2016 (2016-03-25)(United States)
[1]
Running time
95 minutes [2]
CountriesUnited States, Romania
LanguageEnglish

They're Watching is a 2016 American found footage horror movie directed and written by Jay Lender and Micah Wright. The movie features Brigid Brannagh, David Alpay, Kris Lemche and Dimitri Diatchenko and was released in theaters and On Demand on March 25, 2016. [3]

Contents

Plot

The film crew of a popular home-improvement television series goes to a remote village in Moldova to film a follow-up segment about an American homeowner, Becky, who's been transforming a rundown house into an artist's haven. The crew, consisting of Greg, Alex and newcomer Sarah, meet with their irritable producer Kate and a Moldovian businessman named Vladimir. While getting some footage of the town, Greg and Sarah sneak into a funeral and attempt to record it, only to be exposed when Kate calls them by cellphone. A police officer manages to calm the furious crowd before ordering the crew to leave.

The crew continue filming during the next few days while experiencing numerous interruptions and receiving hostility and suspicion from the locals, including an old woman who sneaks into Sarah's hotel room to chant a prayer at her. Greg and Alex later show Sarah a video of Greg and Vladimir walking into a barn to find Kate having sex with Becky's boyfriend Goran six months ago when the house was purchased. Despite telling Kate the camera was off at the time, they planned on showing it to their boss should Kate try to get them dismissed from employment. Vladimir tells the crew a story about how the village had been struck by a plague generations previously, and the villagers had accused a woman who lived alone outside of town of being a witch before burning her alive. During the last planned day of filming, Becky shows the crew a mural on the wall of her cellar that depicts the story. They're interrupted by Alex's cries of pain from outside when a dog he was playing with suddenly becomes aggressive and bites him in the arm. They abandon filming to get Alex's wound at a local butcher's shop, and resolve to finish the next day before their flight leaves.

That evening the crew go to a tavern and attempt to make peace with the locals. Everything goes well until a drunk Sarah instigates a fight by shouting "witch" in the local language. The next day, they rush to finish filming at Becky's home so they can leave Moldova as soon as possible. However, they discover their car has been vandalized and rendered unusable, forcing them to spend the night with Becky and to wait for Goran to arrive the next morning. Vladimir offers to walk to town and bring back a taxicab. Kate blames Sarah for the vehicle's destruction due her actions the previous night, causing Sarah to reveal that the affair was recorded.

A few hours later, Becky and Sarah discover Vladimir's dead body crucified onto an outdoor furnace. So the crew barricade themselves inside the house. Later that night, Greg tells Sarah his story about his time in Afghanistan (something he was uncomfortable to talk about earlier in the movie). While filming at an all-girl school, Taliban local police entered the school and executed a child while forcing Greg to film it. As Greg breaks down in tears, Sarah comforts him and the two then have sex. Later they awaken to find Kate gone. The remaining survivors hear a noise and go out to investigate. They find Kate nailed to a wall of the barn with her intestines hanging out. Sarah sees Goran's car in the barn and realizes Becky has been lying about Goran being gone. She and Alex later learn that Becky knew of Goran's affair with Kate when they saw her in the video, watching them through the window. They believe Becky killed them as an act of vengeance including Vladimir because he witnessed the encounter, and realize Greg could be next because he recorded it. Before they could warn him, the villagers begin breaking into the house, forcing everyone to flee into the basement. There, Sarah uncovers a mural that depicts the production crew's entire stay in Moldova. This including their deaths, as well as a demonic Becky surrounded by fire.

Becky reveals herself as a real witch (implied to be the same witch as for Vladimir's story), who brought the crew to Moldova to witness her vengeance on the villagers. She drinks from a large vat of blood that has the decomposed body of her boyfriend floating in it. She disintegrates Greg, prompting Sarah and Alex to escape into the woods. They run into an angry mob of villagers. Sarah is murdered by the police officer with an axe to the head. Becky appears and uses her powers to kill brutally and bloodily all of the villagers while a terrified Alex records everything. After everyone is dead, Becky orders Alex to share the footage of her rampage with the world before disappearing. The movie ends as a blood-soaked and traumatized Alex wonders how he will explain everything to his boss.

Cast

Reception

On Rotten Tomatoes, the movie has an approval rating of 47% based on 17 reviews, with an average rating of 4.6/10. [4] On Metacritic, the movie has a weighted average of 39 out of 100, based on 7 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews". [5]

Related Research Articles

<i>Night of Dark Shadows</i> 1971 film by Dan Curtis

Night of Dark Shadows is a 1971 horror film by Dan Curtis. It is the sequel to House of Dark Shadows. It centers on the story of Quentin Collins and his bride Tracy at the Collinwood Mansion in Collinsport, Maine.

<i>Cube 2: Hypercube</i> 2002 film by Andrzej Sekula

Cube 2: Hypercube is a 2002 Canadian science fiction horror film directed by Andrzej Sekuła, written by Sean Hood, and produced by Ernie Barbarash, Peter Block, and Suzanne Colvin. It is the second film in the Cube film series and a sequel to Cube.

<i>Cheaper by the Dozen 2</i> 2005 film by Adam Shankman

Cheaper by the Dozen 2 is a 2005 American family comedy film directed by Adam Shankman. It is the sequel to Cheaper by the Dozen (2003) and stars Steve Martin, Bonnie Hunt, Tom Welling, Piper Perabo, and Hilary Duff with Kevin G. Schmidt, Alyson Stoner, Jacob Smith, Forrest Landis, Liliana Mumy, Morgan York, Blake Woodruff, and Brent and Shane Kinsman reprising their roles as members of the 12-child Baker family, alongside Eugene Levy, Carmen Electra, Shawn Roberts, Jaime King, Robbie Amell, Taylor Lautner, and Jonathan Bennett as new characters. It tells the story of the Baker family as they go on a vacation and contend with a rival family, the Murtaughs.

<i>Hocus Pocus</i> (1993 film) 1993 film by Kenny Ortega

Hocus Pocus is a 1993 American fantasy comedy film directed by Kenny Ortega from a screenplay by Mick Garris and Neil Cuthbert, and a story by David Kirschner and Garris. It follows a villainous comedic trio of witches who are inadvertently resurrected by a teenage boy in Salem, Massachusetts on Halloween night.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Katie Griffin</span> Canadian voice actress

Katie Griffin is a Canadian actress who has appeared on television, films and voiced animations. Her roles include the voices of Sailor Mars in the original English Canadian dub of Sailor Moon, Alex in Totally Spies!, Laugh-a-Lot Bear in Care Bears: Journey to Joke-a-lot and Farmer Shire in Corn & Peg. She currently voices Ma Barker in Go, Dog. Go!

<i>The Witches of Eastwick</i> (film) 1987 film by George Miller

The Witches of Eastwick is a 1987 American dark fantasy comedy film directed by George Miller and based on John Updike's 1984 novel of the same name. It stars Jack Nicholson alongside Cher, Michelle Pfeiffer, Susan Sarandon and Veronica Cartwright.

<i>The Descent Part 2</i> 2009 film by Jon Harris

The Descent Part 2 is a 2009 British adventure horror film and sequel to the 2005 horror film The Descent. It was directed by Jon Harris from a screenplay by James McCarthy, J Blakeson, and James Watkins. The film was produced by Christian Colson and Ivana MacKinnon; Neil Marshall, the writer and director of the original, was an executive producer. Shot in London and Surrey, it was released in cinemas in the UK on 2 December 2009 and was given a straight-to-DVD release on 27 April 2010 in the US.

<i>The Blair Witch Project</i> 1999 horror film by Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez

The Blair Witch Project is a 1999 American supernatural horror film written, directed, and edited by Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez. One of the most successful independent films of all time, it is a "found footage" mockumentary in which three students hike into the Black Hills near Burkittsville, Maryland to shoot a documentary about a local myth known as the Blair Witch.

<i>Scooby-Doo! Curse of the Lake Monster</i> 2010 mystery film

Scooby-Doo! Curse of the Lake Monster is a 2010 American made-for-television comedy horror mystery film directed by Brian Levant for Cartoon Network and based on the Saturday morning cartoon series Scooby-Doo by Hanna-Barbera. It is a sequel to the 2009 film Scooby-Doo! The Mystery Begins. Robbie Amell, Hayley Kiyoko, Kate Melton, Nick Palatas, and Frank Welker cast reprise their roles. The film was shot in Santa Clarita, California, and Sherwood Country Club in Thousand Oaks, California, and premiered on October 16, 2010.

<i>Red Riding Hood</i> (2011 film) 2011 film by Catherine Hardwicke

Red Riding Hood is a 2011 American romantic fantasy horror film directed by Catherine Hardwicke, and produced by Leonardo DiCaprio, from a screenplay by David Leslie Johnson. The film is very loosely based on the folk tale "Little Red Riding Hood" collected by both Charles Perrault under the name Le Petit Chaperon Rouge and several decades later by the Brothers Grimm as Rotkäppchen. It stars Amanda Seyfried as the title role, with Gary Oldman, Billy Burke, Shiloh Fernandez, Max Irons, Virginia Madsen, Lukas Haas and Julie Christie in supporting roles.

<i>The Tunnel</i> (2011 film) 2011 film by Carlo Ledesma

The Tunnel is a 2011 Australian found-footage monster horror film directed by Carlo Ledesma and co-written, co-produced, and co-edited by Julian Harvey and Enzo Tedeschi. The film stars Bel Deliá, Andy Rodoreda, Steve Davis, Luke Arnold, Goran D. Kleut, and James Caitlin in a documentary-style horror story set in the underground network of abandoned railway tunnels in Sydney, Australia, where a journalist and her crew discover something horrifying lurking within the tunnels.

<i>The Frankenstein Theory</i> 2013 American film

The Frankenstein Theory is a 2013 American horror film directed by Andrew Weiner and stars Kris Lemche, Joe Egender, Timothy V. Murphy, and Eric Zuckerman. The film is distributed by Image Entertainment. It is presented as "found footage", pieced together from a film crew's footage. The film relates the story of a documentary film crew that follows a professor who journeys to the Arctic Circle in order to prove that Mary Shelley's classic 1818 novel, Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, was based on fact.

<i>Marble Hornets</i> YouTube web series

Marble Hornets is an alternate reality YouTube web series based on the Slender Man online mythos. The first video was posted on YouTube on June 20, 2009, following a post that its creator, Troy Wagner, created on the Something Awful forum the previous day. It was the first web series to be created around the character, with the first episode premiering exactly 10 days after the appearance of the original images of Slender Man on the Something Awful forums, and the first Marble Hornets affiliated post being 9 days after the character's creation.

<i>Unfriended</i> 2014 film by Levan Gabriadze

Unfriended is a 2014 American screenlife supernatural horror film directed by Levan Gabriadze and produced by Timur Bekmambetov. Set on a computer screen, the film stars Shelley Hennig, Moses Storm, Renee Olstead, Will Peltz, Jacob Wysocki, and Courtney Halverson as six high school students in a Skype conversation which is haunted by a student, played by Heather Sossaman, who was bullied by them and committed suicide. The film is told almost entirely through a screencast of a MacBook.

<i>The Witch</i> (2015 film) Film by Robert Eggers

The Witch is a 2015 folk horror film written and directed by Robert Eggers in his feature directorial debut. It stars Anya Taylor-Joy in her feature film debut, alongside Ralph Ineson, Kate Dickie, Harvey Scrimshaw, Ellie Grainger, and Lucas Dawson. Set in 1630s New England, its plot follows a Puritan family who encounter forces of evil in the woods beyond their farm.

<i>Tales of Halloween</i> 2015 American film

Tales of Halloween is a 2015 American comedy horror anthology film consisting of ten interlocking segments, each revolving around the holiday indicated by the title. Segments were directed by Neil Marshall, Darren Lynn Bousman, Axelle Carolyn, Lucky McKee, Andrew Kasch, Paul Solet, John Skipp, Adam Gierasch, Jace Anderson, Mike Mendez, Ryan Schifrin, and Dave Parker.

<i>Holidays</i> (2016 film) 2016 American film

Holidays is a 2016 American horror anthology film of short horror films, each inspired by a different celebration. The directors include Kevin Smith, Gary Shore, Adam Egypt Mortimer, Scott Stewart, Nicholas McCarthy, Kevin Kölsch and Dennis Widmyer, Sarah Adina Smith, and Anthony Scott Burns.

<i>Her Smell</i> 2018 film directed by Alex Ross Perry

Her Smell is a 2018 American drama film written, co-produced and directed by Alex Ross Perry. It stars Elisabeth Moss, Cara Delevingne, Dan Stevens, Agyness Deyn, Gayle Rankin, Ashley Benson, Dylan Gelula, Eka Darville and Lindsay Burdge and follows Moss as fictional rock star Becky Something, whose band experiences brief fame but is broken up by her self-destructive behavior.

<i>Vampires vs. the Bronx</i> American comedy horror film

Vampires vs. the Bronx is a 2020 American comedy black horror film directed by Oz Rodriguez and written by Rodriguez and Blaise Hemingway. The film follows a group of teenagers who are forced to protect their neighborhood in the Bronx when a gathering of vampires invades. It stars Jaden Michael, Gerald W. Jones III, Gregory Diaz IV, Sarah Gadon, Method Man, Shea Whigham, and Coco Jones.

<i>Paranormal Activity: Next of Kin</i> 2021 film by William Eubank

Paranormal Activity: Next of Kin is a 2021 American found footage supernatural horror film directed by William Eubank, written by Christopher Landon, and produced by Jason Blum and series creator Oren Peli. Serving as the seventh installment of the Paranormal Activity series, the film stars Emily Bader, Roland Buck III, Dan Lippert, Henry Ayres-Brown, and Tom Nowicki, and follows a group who attempt to make a documentary on an Amish community, only for them to discover the horrific secrets the town holds.

References

  1. ↑ Michael Gingold. ""THEY'RE WATCHING," and you can see them next month &#124". Fangoria . Retrieved 2016-03-08.
  2. ↑ "They're Watching (2016) - Movie". Moviefone . Retrieved 2016-03-08.
  3. ↑ MrDisgusting (2016-03-03). "'They're Watching' Trailer Only a Taste Of the Insanity to Follow". Bloody Disgusting . Retrieved 2016-03-08.
  4. ↑ "They're Watching". Rotten Tomatoes . Fandango Media . Retrieved October 10, 2021. OOjs UI icon edit-ltr-progressive.svg
  5. ↑ "They're Watching Reviews". Metacritic . Retrieved November 29, 2023.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.