Bigfoot Sightings & Finding Bigfoot: 'Willow Creek' Film Opens With Warm Reviews
The new Bigfoot horror film "Willow Creek," set to hit theaters on June 6, is receiving fairly good to mixed reviews from movie critics.
The fictitious documentary was directed by actor and comedian Bobcat Goldthwait, who also directed "God Bless America" and "World's Greatest Dad." In the movie, a Bigfoot enthusiast named Jim, played by Bryce Johnson, drags his skeptical girlfriend Kelly, played by Alexie Gilmore, on a search for the mythological creature into the ominous woods in California's Six Rivers National Forest. The young couple documents each minute of their journey with a video recorder, including their interviews with Bigfoot believers and naysayers in the town near the woods.
Evan Dickson of Bloody Disgusting gave the film a good review, saying, "I'm usually leery of found-footage features, but this movie wins out by concentrating on characters that are actually engaging (rather than onscreen camera-operating ciphers)."
Likewise, the New York Daily News said, "The parts are greater than the whole, but there's a lot to like here, including the easy interplay between the leads. And extra credit goes to Goldthwait for making the found-footage thing feel fresh, something almost as elusive as Sasquatch."
However, The New York Times critic Jeannette Catsoulis said the film is reminiscent of "The Blair Witch Project" and predictable. But, she made note of one scene in the film, saying, "Mr. Goldthwait gives us lovely, buttery daylight scenes, nicely relaxed leads and dialogue that pays attention to fluctuating gender dynamics. He also engineers a static, almost wordless 19-minute shot inside a tent that generates more tension than many horror directors achieve with a swarm of foley artists and a healthier budget. This canny exploitation of the power of silence is unnerving; that it should come from one of our most aggressively vocal performers is an unexpected treat."
The Hollywood Reporter, on the other hand, gave "'Willow Creek" a lackluster review, stating that "Despite the impressively committed performances by the two leads and the screenplay's touches of sly humor, the proceedings are mostly all too redolent of the endless found-footage horror films that have followed in the wake of The Blair Witch Project. Running a scant 80 minutes, Willow Creek doesn't exactly wear out its welcome. But it does make one hope that now that Goldthwait, an acknowledged Bigfoot buff, has gotten this one out of his system, he'll go back to making more of his wildly adventurous comedies."
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