Megan is Missing (2011)

Megan is Missing (2011)

directed by:  Michael Goi

starring:  Amber Perkins, Rachel Quinn, Dean Waite,

format:  Personal Collection NTSC:  Region 1



(out of 5)



     I friggn' love found footage films!  I try and see everything I can in that department.  The more shakey the camera the better I say ha ha ha.  For me there is no film style out there that puts the viewer inside the movie like pov/sov movies.  I guess the first one I ever saw was Cannibal Holocaust and maybe before that The Legend of Boggy Creek but really that's more of a mockumentary film.  People complain about these types of films to no end and my question every time is, "Why do you watch found footage movies when you know exactly how they are shot?"
 

But I digress.  Megan is Missing is a terrifying look into the lives of teenaged girls today.  Having a teenaged girl in my home only made this movie even more scary for me.  I really dug into this flick and towards the end I was literally locked to the screen.  We follow friends Amy and Megan and their daily lives of high school, boys, parents, and parties.  The screen jumps around from cameras to computer chat screens.  The girls are both very different, Amy is a girl next door type both modest and quiet while Megan is quite the opposite being very out going and popular.  Megan and Amy tell each other everything sex, Megan being raped by her stepfather, school gossip.  Soon it's revealed that Megan has a male online friend named Josh and after a short time they make a date.  Well Megan never comes home from that date and when Amy confronts Josh online about Megan's disappearance he claims the girl never made it to their meeting place.  Days go by and Megan is still missing.  Everyone in the town is searching for her and there is even a cable show about her possible abduction and a video is released of Megan walking through a parking lot and getting picked up by some unknown man whose face is just out of the camera angle.  Amy is a little naïve at first but soon enough figures out that Josh is more than a little suspect.  Amy publicly blames Josh for the disappearance and that's when her own problems start. 

     She begins taking video herself in a park still looking for her best friend when she assumes that everyone else has given up after weeks and weeks of searching.  We see as the viewer in one shot in particular it appears as if some one is watching from the trees.  Amy never notices this.  The video ends with a man's arm reaching for her and goes fuzzy.  Later the camera is found in  a trash can in the park when the police begin searching for now Amy.  Soon after the last 22 minutes of the camera are shown and this is where things get particularly disturbing.  Photos of a tortured girl also show up on a website of a girl bound to a sort of table with holes for a head and two hands.  Amy is shown on the video being forced to eat from a bowl using no hands or utensils.  She is raped on camera and then finally she gets to see Megan.  And that's where my review shall end.  I highly recommend this film to anyone who enjoys found footage films.   I loved it.  Disturbing but not over the top.  Even the rape scene (for those who can watch people die or be tortured but can't watch a rape) isn't as nasty as it truly could have been the camera never leaves her face. 
     Both actresses in the movie did a superb job I was very impressed.  Even their bitch friends from high school were very natural.  The movie for me just didn't have anything too negative at all and I would have possibly given it a 5 bloody hand print rating if it weren't for the far too long shot of "Josh" digging a hole.  It goes on an on way too long.  But that's it, that's my only complaint.