'Unfriended' not your typical found footage film

It seems this day in age the horror genre gets generic after a while, with the same found footage and that thuds to make the decibel levels jump. Unfriended is different from the counterpart horror films in two ways. The first is that it takes place entirely on a computer screen, and secondly this horror teen thriller tackles the touchy subject of suicide and bullying patterns, that is a present problem that teenagers in our society are encountering. Unfriended is rated 13 + for subject matter, violence, scenes of horror and scenes of sensuality. This cyber natural thriller is directed by Russian director Levan Gabriadze.

The film starts out with a glitchy Universal logo. Boom, we are looking at the main actor, Blaire Lily's computer screen. Blaire is tapping away looking up various articles and videos of her high school Laura Barns. This includes a video of Laura parting and in another video committing suicide. We find out that it is the anniversary of the suicide of Laura Barns. Spotify opens up and starts playing, as Blaire has an intimate chat with her boyfriend Mitch about losing her virginity over Skype. They are interrupted with a sudden collection of their Skype friends open up a conversation with them, and make fun of them having an intimate moment, which includes the childish Mitch's boner joke. There is also a ghost person named Billy, who is thought to be a glitch. We find out later that the "glitch" will not leave them alone. Blaire also keeps receiving messages from Laura Burns via Facebook. As much as these are a group of friends we see how rumours, harassment and bullying can lead to fights within the group of friends. The horror starts when various connections get laggy followed by sudden horrific and gruesome character deaths. Billy forces all the remaining teenagers to confess their sins, as well the biggest sin of all their involvement in the leaky Laura YouTube video, that lead Laura to commit suicide.

Unfriended has found it's target audience social media saavy teens who are looking for something a little beyond the typical PG-13 flick. Having the main action on the computer screen becomes interesting, because we get a character study of Blair through her internet searches, web history, pages tabbed or even in the way she will type, delete and retype. Most of all even though we read about it or see it in the news, Unfriended confronts their target audience with the themes of teenage bullying and suicide is where it succeeds as a horror film providing a social commentary to it's target viewers.

4/5