“You should be so proud of her.”
Shelby Oaks is something special when you look at it objectively; it’s a film that was crowd funded by the YouTuber Chris Stuckmann, who wanted to take a shot at making a movie of his very own. The original goal was to raise $600,000, but by the time his Kickstarter was closed, he was able to raise over 1.4 million to make his film. Before he’d even begun filming, this is already an impressive achievement considering how many established filmmakers struggle to get funds together to make their own films. For Shelby Oaks, over 14,000 people contributed to funding the dream for this directorial debut, so again, in my book Chris Stuckmann already won for being able to pull this off. Now the film has a producing credit from Mike Flanagam attached as an executive producer and Neon in charge of the films distribution … so needless to say, there is a great deal of hype around this film. Two films immediately come to mind when I think about this kind of hype before a film even reaches audiences, The Blair Witch Project and Paranormal Activity … both films that innovated the found-footage genre but also had some clever marketing once acquired for distribution. Does Shelby Oaks live up to the hype? Well, from my experience, this is a pretty divisive film.
The film starts up as though it were a documentary that is covering the disappearance of a paranormal investigation team, “The Paranormal Paranoids”, that has gone missing. As it plays out, eventually a few of the team members are found brutally murdered, and there is a tape that shows their demise, though what happened to Riley Brennan (Sarah Dunn) remains a mystery and for years has people wondering what could have happened to her. Leading that charge to solve the mystery is Riley’s sister, Mia (Camille Sullivan), and after 12 years have passed it seems all hope is gone until a mysterious figure shows up on Mia’s doorstep and kills himself in front of her, and in his hands is a DV cassette tape labeled “Shelby Oaks”. At this point the film shifts its style and is more a straightforward horror film as we follow Mia down the rabbit hole of what is on the DV tape and who the man was who died on her doorstep.
First off, I absolutely loved the first act of this film, and I have to admit I wasn’t a fan of the style change. The first act is great with setting up the lore behind the film, and this is where you can see how it was heavily influenced by The Blair Witch Project (minus the shaky cam). When the film progresses and it is shot like a standard film, it definitely lost some of its charm and realism, and I feel that was the films greatest strength from the start. It’s no surprise that the film has us follow Mia along as she goes about attempting to solve her sister’s disappearance on her own. What did win me over is how the film actually goes to some famous “haunted” locations, the most famous of them being the Ohio State Reformatory, which is where The Shawshank Redemption was filmed. As a geek for paranormal investigation, the film taking place at these paranormal hot spots was fun to see, though I understand casual viewers would simply shrug this off. That being said, I wish we got more of Mia investigating these spots to really follow in her sister’s shoes, but these moments are rushed, and the jump scares added in these scenes just seem forced and not earned, which is a shame, because these are some creepy locations with no set dressing needed.
As the film progresses to the third act, this really has me conflicted in how I feel about this film. The film takes a pretty dark turn, and I appreciate that the film was willing to go there … but this third act (resolution) just feels too rushed. I understand this film was done on a tight budget, but I wish this film had been given at least 15-25 minutes more to stretch out and let it breathe and develop more tension. So much takes place in the final act that as an audience you don’t get to let these moments settle in. There’s no time for dread or suspense; it just happens.
By no means would I say this film is bad; in fact I really liked it, but I can’t help but think what this film could have been with a bigger budget and if Stuckmann had just a little more experience. The film certainly has flickers of greatness, and you can see that Stuckmann does have talent and should be a filmmaker to keep your eye on. It is unfortunate that the film relies too heavily on familiar tropes, and I do feel a bit cheated with the film’s payoff. Still, I had a good time with it, and it is something I’ll inevitably revisit.
