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The Victim (1972) / Exhibit A (2007)






Elizabeth Montgomery (Bewitched) stars in this early 70’s made for TV mystery about a woman who goes to her sister’s country house and begins to suspect something is amiss when the sister is not there.











Kate Wainwright (Montgomery) has a phone conversation with her sister Susan, who tells Kate that she plans on divorcing her husband, Ben (George Maharis). After hanging up, Susan is confronted by a mystery person. Kate decides to drive up to Susan’s country home to spend time with her. She gets to the house but finds Susan is not home. A storm begins, and Kate finds herself trapped in the house, with only the creepy, grouchy housekeeper (Mrs. Hawkers) who lives next door. As the night progresses, Kate begins to suspect that someone else is lurking around as she keeps hearing odd noises around the house.









The movie is your typical retro TV affair, with suspenseful music, POV shots of a mystery person spying on Kate, and a plot filled with all the classic thriller tropes, including thunder and lightning, the power going out, the telephone line being cut, and a red herring character. At about 75 minutes, the movie zips by fast, with Kate slowly realizing that something is wrong, leading to the overdramatic and hilarious climax. If you love this cheesy retro stuff, it's available on YouTube.








This next movie is a 2007 found footage thriller about a young teenage girl who documents her family life with her new video camera, unaware that she's about to capture a disturbing descent into chaos.













Judith is gifted a camcorder by her father Andy, and she uses it to record footage of her family. She documents the everyday events in the lives of Dad, Mother Sheila, and brother Joe. She appears to have a secret crush on the teenage girl next door, Claire, and seems crushed when her parents announce that they will be moving to a new home now that the dad Andy has gotten a promotion at work. As Judith continues to film the family preparing for the move, she begins to notice increased tension from her father, including spying on him outside at night, nervously smoking a cigarette, and having frequent arguments with her mother. As she continues to film, she stumbles upon things that the father has been hiding, leading to escalating tensions within the family.











The movie is decently acted, slowly showing the father's descent into madness as he finds himself increasingly stressed over finances, behaving erratically and having explosive arguments with his wife and son. Instead of the usual supernatural shenanigans that most found footage films give us, it's interesting to see one that shows how tension can destroy a family and lead to violence and tragedy. It's like one of those true crime stories told through the lens of home video recordings. If you enjoy the found footage genre, as well as true crime stories (even though this is fiction), you might enjoy this one. It's available on Tubi. 








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