What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: I picked up on nods to Scanners , RoboCop and, erm, Paranormal Activity vibes.
By the time 2012’s “V/H/S” arrived, we were knee deep in “Paranormal Activity” sequels and countless POV possession thrillers with no end in sight.
The first V/H/S movie came out in 2012, arriving at the tail end of the low-budget found-footage horror craze ( Paranormal Activity and REC came out in 2007; Cloverfield was 2008) and capturing the last moment in culture before VCRs became totally obsolete.
Barrett proves the most ambitious in this respect, filming “The Empty Wake” from three (mostly) stationary cameras, and building tension from the way he cuts among them; it’s a variation on the wonders the Paranormal Activity franchise has worked with fixed angles and restricted point-of-view.