The McPherson Tape (aka “Alien Abduction”)
Despite my hatred for "found footage" horror films, my interest was piqued by see that this was a "found footage" film from 1989—predating ostensible genre inventor "The Blair Witch Project" by several years. It's sort of like discovering a heavy metal band from 1963.
Interestingly, this film about a family birthday party interrupted by the appearance of aliens shows that the "found footage" genre emerged fully failed from the beginning.
This earliest known example contains everything that sucks about the genre: little plot, a complete disregard for pacing in favor of dwelling for too long on irrelevant conversation between uninteresting characters (do we, as viewers, really need to spend 5 minutes watching the family say their goodbyes to each other after dinner?), difficult-to-watch low-quality camerawork with zero cinematography, muddy sound, and an all-around lack of any qualities that might make it worth spending the time to watch.
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