I'd been waiting to see "The Poughkeepsie Tapes" for quite a while now and I'm glad to say it was nicely done pseudo-snuff mockumentary, for the most part. It ain't the 'roughest' thing out there but a few scenes are actually pretty chilling, mainly in a "what the fuck" type of way (mainly a scene involving a masked man crawling slowly on all fours towards a bound victim). The movie focuses on a serial killer terrorizing a New York suburb and ruthlessly torturing women in his basement. Not only that - he records it all on video... Apparently, over eight-hundred videos were recovered from a closet in his home during a raid. Other segments of the movie feature some mock-interviews with FBI agents, forensic detectives, a dismemberment expert (yeah, that one puzzles me), and some of the "victim's" friends and family. There are good amounts of kidnappings and cruelty "caught" on camera that are really the highlights of the flick, though most are very unbelievable. Like the killer hitching a ride with a young couple, a home invasion that seems a little too aberrant in the film's natural "flow", and especially a scene in which the killer approaches the grieving mother of one of his victims with a camera... The actors used in the interviews also didn't really convince me... All the gripes aside, "The Poughkeepsie Tapes" definitely has it's strong points, mainly in it's scenes of basement torture, ego-maniacal deviance and strong sexual dominance portrayed from the prolific killer through his homemade snuff archives. This is definitely recommended for those who seek out "fake snuff" movies, just don't expect any consistent display of madcap realism... I guess it really doesn't matter in the long-run...
I'd been waiting to see "The Poughkeepsie Tapes" for quite a while now and I'm glad to say it was nicely done pseudo-snuff mockumentary, for the most part. It ain't the 'roughest' thing out there but a few scenes are actually pretty chilling, mainly in a "what the fuck" type of way (mainly a scene involving a masked man crawling slowly on all fours towards a bound victim). The movie focuses on a serial killer terrorizing a New York suburb and ruthlessly torturing women in his basement. Not only that - he records it all on video... Apparently, over eight-hundred videos were recovered from a closet in his home during a raid. Other segments of the movie feature some mock-interviews with FBI agents, forensic detectives, a dismemberment expert (yeah, that one puzzles me), and some of the "victim's" friends and family. There are good amounts of kidnappings and cruelty "caught" on camera that are really the highlights of the flick, though most are very unbelievable. Like the killer hitching a ride with a young couple, a home invasion that seems a little too aberrant in the film's natural "flow", and especially a scene in which the killer approaches the grieving mother of one of his victims with a camera... The actors used in the interviews also didn't really convince me... All the gripes aside, "The Poughkeepsie Tapes" definitely has it's strong points, mainly in it's scenes of basement torture, ego-maniacal deviance and strong sexual dominance portrayed from the prolific killer through his homemade snuff archives. This is definitely recommended for those who seek out "fake snuff" movies, just don't expect any consistent display of madcap realism... I guess it really doesn't matter in the long-run...
