Horrorific content by adrian on August 30th, 2018 | Movie Review, Worth Watching? | Alien, Sci-Fi, Teen, Found Footage
It’s about three teens who go missing shortly after the infamous, real-life, Phoenix Lights were witnessed back in '97.
Phoenix Forgotten was directed by Justin Barber and stars Florence Hartigan, Jeanine Jackson and Chelsea Lopez (from Are We Not Cats).
Back on March 13th, 1997 a cluster of (still) unidentified flying lights were witnessed by thousands of people over a span of 3 hours across Arizona, Nevada and Mexico. A triangular formation of lights were seen passing over the region and a series of stationary lights were filmed hovering over Phoenix. The Air Force claimed the lights were flares that were dropped from a plane during a training exercise, which has since been debunked, and the governor at the time downplayed the hype but later admitted to believe the lights were "otherworldly".
Fast-forward 20 years and Ridley Scott (yes, that Ridley Scott) helped bring us Phoenix Forgotten, a found footage horror about three teens who vanished shortly after the mysterious light sightings.
I was hesitant to watch this, mainly because it's yet another found footage, but since Phoenix is my hometown it was hard not to give it a shot. I moved here a year after the sightings so I only knew about it from all the buzz it was still getting. Co-workers talking about it, new theories on the local news, etc. So the chance to see the incident in feature-length form was just too tempting to turn away from.
And I'm glad I didn't pass this one up, Phoenix Forgotten just happened to be a solid found footage. Shaky cam wasn't too distracting, there was a lot of backstory, full character development, a ton of tension building and no jump scares. Overall it was a gripping horror that was easy to get pulled into.
Founder and Executive Director of all things Horrific at AllHorror.com (Ok, actually I'm just a guy who watches way too many horror movies. It's unhealthy, really).
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