09 of 31 Horror Movies I've Never Seen 2016: The Sacrament (2013)

I should probably start this with the fact that I'm not the biggest fan of "fount footage" genre.  It's not that I don't find the device amusing, but I have serious issues when the line is broken.  By the line, of course, I mean when shots start showing up looking too seamlessly edited.  If the gimmick is that the film is made up of "found" footage than it should look that way.  While the film itself is definitely creepy, Ti West's The Sacrament somehow managed to engage me and enrage me at the same time.

Imagine if the Jonestown Massacre had been caused and then covered by a VICE team: Jake (Joe Swanberg), Sam (AJ Bowen), and Patrick (Kentucker Audley.)  That's The Sacrament, just change the name from Jonestown to Eden Parish and Jim Jones to The Father.  Not really much else to tell about it story wise.  What I thought worked very well though, even knowing exactly what the outcome had to be, was the build up to the massacre.  Using the docudrama method we get to see a little bit of the VICE team's thoughts behind the scenes of their interviewing and experiences at Eden Parish.  West paces these moments very well creating a false sense of security so that when things start to get unsettling it's sudden and startling.

What drove me crazy throughout the film were too many moments where the camera impossibly cut.  With found footage the number of camera's is dictated by the character cameramen.  In the case of The Sacrament there is only one cameraman, Jake, and for ONE scene, we find out that Patrick's DSLR can shoot video.  However, before the aforementioned scene there are numerous cuts that looked good for film, but not good in terms of found footage.  Good meaning that they would be impossible to achieve with only one camera.  If the viewer is capable of conveniently forgetting this, it's not a problem, but otherwise it takes the viewer out.  It's jarring.

Otherwise, I thought the actors were all very convincing.  AJ Bowen's well meaning subjective observer who feels compelled to get involved was very empathetic and believable.  Amy Seimetz, as Patrick's cultist sister Caroline pretty much embodied the brainwashed psychopath.  No one, however, holds a candle to Gene Jones as The Father.  The only other person I can even think of that could play the character that way is John Goodman.  The man was so damn creepy and yet so charismatic that it made me kind of understand how so many people fell for Jim Jones' trip.  All this said, the film is worth watching, it just might be a very frustrating viewing.