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The final 18 minutes of Dutch Marich‘s Horror in the High Desert could easily be the most unsettling piece of footage I’ve seen in the last decade. And I like to watch every single found footage film I can get my hands on. I’m seasoned enough to endure even the scariest films of the subgenre, and have been watching horror films for more than 30 years. However, Marich’s masterful montage of the last documented minutes of Gary Hinge got me. That night I wasn’t able to shake off the feeling that someone out there had knowledge of inner fears I wasn’t familiar with.
The other 62 minutes of Marich’s film are an essential buildup for a film that wouldn’t work without its dramatized backdrop about a guy who goes missing and strange clues start appearing after. Horror in the High Desert is a film shot under the mockumentary format and it tells the story of people trying to come to terms with what’s essentially a very mysterious case of a missing person. Hinge documented everything on his hike and the last minutes of footage were found. Of course, the film is a buildup to the moment we’ll see that footage that will surely hold the secret of what happened to the young hiker. I won’t spoil, but I can tell you it’s insanely disturbing without the necessity of exposing too much.
Marich is a master behind his own concept and he’s confident enough to make a whole feature about a fictional concern. Fortunately, it works because it takes itself too seriously as it should happen with found footage. Without the much needed conviction of “this is true”, it’s hard for a filmmaker to make a film of this nature. Horror in the High Desert goes all the way in using the premise to deliver an ending that will curdle your blood, and this sounds like he’s not paying attention to the effective rule created by The Blair Witch Project. But please, give it a chance. You won’t regret it as Horror in the High Desert is one of the few found footage films whose entire running time consists of relevant footage. Again, its main course arrives in the final minutes, but at last you feel like Marich is talented enough to be able to create a whole universe out of this.
For some members of the audience, found footage films can be extricated from their realistic aspect and discarded like horror trash. For others like I, they’re the result of weaponizing pieces of film. Horror in the High Desert is a very good example of doing things right by planning everything to the core and executing and editing with the only true intention to scare the wits out of those who find themselves trapped by the realism of this subgenre. I didn’t have a great time with this one in a good way. My only reaction was to contact the guy who made this, congratulate him for having created a very scary piece of modern horror and kindly ask for a follow-up. I want more, even if I know sometimes it’s simply too much for my mind.
Founder of Screentology. Member of the OFCS. RT Certified Critic
Dog dad.
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– Armessa Movie News