phancy.com - horror reviews - MOH 2023

The Outwaters



IMDb Info

Release Year: 2022
Runtime: 1h 50m
Country: USA
Language: English
Genre Tags: Horror, Sci-Fi, Thriller
Plot Summary: Four travelers encounter menacing phenomena while camping in a remote stretch of the Mojave Desert.

Poster - Title Card


phancy.com rating:

phancy.com notes: A mood piece, more than anything else. The found footage conceit is unnecessary, but forgivable given the first act is surprisingly character-driven. When everything goes sideways, it's never quite scary, never quite coherent, but always compelling. Essentially the POV of someone going insane. And possibly looping through time. The sound design is amazing, and is the real MVP of the movie.


Outside Reviews:

Brian Tallerico
3 out of 4 stars - rogerebert.com

It's funny how brightly lit and close-up the first quarter of "The Outwaters" is because the rest of the film will be seen largely through an incredibly small flashlight, the kind of illumination your phone provides in the middle of a pitch-black night. Following in the footsteps of the low-budget hit "Skinamarink," 2023 has already produced another minimalist mindf**k, one that dares you to use your imagination regarding what's happening outside that tiny beam of light. This film takes no prisoners, offers no explanations, and forces you to go on its twisted journey that blends found footage structure with something that H.P. Lovecraft might have dreamed up. It's a ride.


Austen Goslin
The Outwaters breaks the found-footage rules in squirmy ways

While The Outwaters never entirely reaches those lofty highs, it does similarly demand more of its audience than the average found-footage film. It works within the confines of the genre only long enough to break the traditions, and by the time all hell breaks loose, it's so far past the boundaries of the subgenre that it becomes something else entirely. The mixture of point-of-view shots, traditional found footage, and the sense of some eerie third-party observer unstuck from time or reality all create an effect that takes us deeper into Robbie's unraveling mind than a more conventional horror movie ever could.