Occult

The director Koji Shiraishi is investigating an incident. Years ago a man attacked people at random at a tourist site; three died and the attacker went to prison. He talks with the survivors. One of them is strange: a man called Eno was wounded in the back during the attack and the scar looks like a mark. Eno cannot hold a job, lives without a home and says he is constantly waiting for something. The camera starts following him. Unexplained images are recorded around him. The man says he has been given a task. Koji Shiraishi directs and appears under his own name. Shohei Uno is in the cast. It is a Japanese production. Its form is found footage; the narrative is built as a documentary shoot and the camera is always in a character's hand. Shiraishi made several films in this mode and is cited for the approach in Japanese horror. What the narrative builds is uncertainty; the film does not reveal for a long time whether what we see is real or staged. It gives the supernatural late and the first half proceeds entirely as investigation. Its last section changes the register completely and the narrative loses control on purpose. The effects are limited and the budget low; the fear is built largely through sound and waiting. Its limit is pace; the first half is slow and the found footage form tires some viewers. Who it is for: viewers who like Japanese horror and the found footage genre. Who it is not for: it is slow, the camera movement uncomfortable, and the finale excessive.