Found Footage: The Making of the Patterson Project (2025) by Mark Tzannes

Director: Mark Tzannes

Year: 2025

Country: USA

Alternate Titles: N/A

Genre: Supernatural; Horror/Comedy

Plot:

Preparing for a new documentary, a filmmaker follows the celebrated director of a new Bigfoot horror film trying to complete his first full-length feature with an incompetent crew in the woods, only for the sheer chaos of the situation to overwhelm him as he tries to keep the project rolling.

Review:

Overall, this was a pretty solid and hilarious style effort. The fact that this one decides to work as well as it does, with the series of trials and tribulations detailing the making of an independent movie. With the focus early on talking about what goes into making a feature-length film at this stage of the industry, from gathering the production crew, the investors, and the pratfalls that go along when ambition outweighs their budget, it creates a strong starting point to the insanity to come. Getting to see how actual low-budget filmmaking works, from last-minute script alterations to fit within allocated funds, available locations, or changing cast members, the switching emotions from euphoria to stress create a fun energy.

Once filming starts and the sheer chaos of the situation starts going haywire with incompetent actions, bizarre choices to try while acting, and the need to improvise around everything, the comedy about how nothing goes right makes this all the better. Needing to find workarounds for everything that goes on at the shoot, oftentimes just spur-of-the-moment solutions, makes for some comedic escalation of how bad things get, which prepares for a rather fun time throughout here. This works far better than the inclusion of the cursed material that starts to point to the demonic forces at the source of the trouble, as while that changes the film into a more overt genre effort, it's introduced so late that it really means little to the rest of the film. Otherwise, there's a lot to like here.

Overview: ***.5/5

An immensely entertaining genre mockumentary, there’s quite a lot to like here, which manages to keep going above a few minor issues that do appear in this one. Those with an appreciation for this type of material or who are curious about it will have the most to like here, while most others might want to heed caution.