Always Watching: A Marble Hornets Story

Always Watching: A Marble Hornets Story

Theatrical release poster
Directed by James Moran
Produced by Jimmy Miller
M. Riley
Screenplay by Ian Shorr
Based on Marble Hornets
by Joseph DeLage
Troy Wagner
Starring Alexandra Breckenridge
Chris Marquette
Jake McDorman
Doug Jones
Cinematography Ulf Soderqvist
Edited by Wendy Nomiyama
Production
company
Mosaic
Good Universe
GraceSam
Distributed by Gravitas Ventures
Release dates
  • April 7, 2015 (2015-04-07)

(Video on demand)

  • May 15, 2015 (2015-05-15)

(Limited release)

Running time
 92 minutes
Country United States
Language English

Always Watching: A Marble Hornets Story is a 2015 American horror movie directed by James Moran and starring Alexandra Breckenridge, Chris Marquette, Jake McDorman and Doug Jones. The film was released on video on demand on April 7, 2015, and opened in select theaters on May 15, 2015.[1][2]

The movie is a film adaptation of YouTube web series Marble Hornets inspired by the Slender Man online mythos.[3] The first episode was posted on YouTube on June 20, 2009, following a post of its co-creator Troy Wagner on Something Awful the previous day.[4]

Plot

The movie starts with Eli (Brendon Huor) and Jamie (Mickey Facchinello) holding a camera, seemingly fleeing through the woods. Jamie hits a button on her key to unlock hers and Eli's car, indicating they are extremely close to their vehicle. However, Jamie stops when she realizes that Eli has disappeared. She stops to look for him, but spots The Operator (Doug Jones), a tall, faceless creature in a suit. She reaches the car and locks herself inside before starting it. Eli, who seems to be blankly standing in front of the car, doesn't respond as Jamie begs him to get into the car. Eli rushes to Jamie's door, and bashes his head through the door's window. He then drags Jamie out of the car and pulls her to the ground. A loud crack is heard, implying that Jamie was killed, and the tape abruptly cuts off.

Milo (Chris Marquette) is a member of a news reporting team, and has a crush on his coworker, Sara (Alexandra Breckenridge). Charlie (Jake McDorman), an Ivy League graduate, has just transferred to the team, upsetting Milo and his chances at getting with Sara. The three are given the assignment of investigating the mysterious disappearance of a man named Dan (Michael Bunin). Milo is tasked with investigating a series of Mini-DVR tapes that Dan shot. Many are simply birthday tapes or other such filmings, however after some analysis, Milo begins findings images of the Operator in the tapes.

He brings this up to both Sara and Charlie, who seem interested and confused at the situation, and ask Milo to delve into the tapes. Milo continues doing so, but is struck by an odd power outage. Eventually, Milo finds the Operator Symbol, a circle with an "x" through it, engraved into his neck. The situation becomes even more dangerous when the suited man appears in his backyard. Milo demands that he leave, however The Operator teleports closer to Milo, covering nearly thirty feet in an instant, and Milo flees into his house.

He eventually flees to Sara's home, interrupting her and a shirtless Charlie, which brings Charlie to anger. Charlie eventually forces a screaming Milo out of the house, with Sara not trying to argue against it. Milo refuses to go home, and decides to sleep in his car. He contemplates calling the police, but decides against it.

The following day, he goes home and finds his dog, Marlo, running about. He thinks someone is in the kitchen, but checks the upstairs bedroom on a hunch and finds Charlie. Charlie angrily confronts Milo over the months of footage Milo has of Sara doing things like shopping, going to work, and leaving her house. Sara comes in and is disgusted by what she sees, and Milo begins to panic. Charlie refuses to let him touch a camera, and Milo then tells him to grab the camera and look around. Through the camera, Charlie the closet door flying open, and The Operator rushing him. Charlie panics and drops the camera, and all three take off from the house. All three get marked as they run, gradually losing sleep and becoming highly irritable. While at a hotel, Charlie and Milo find out that Sara is abusing drugs, most likely prescription medication. Milo, enraged, searches through her belongings. Charlie, angry Milo is throwing him aside and pushing Sara, proceeds to knock Milo down and kick him repeatedly, before trying to kill him with a microwave. He drops it as the door flies open, indicating The Operator has appeared. They are forced to forget about their fight and flee again. Eventually, at Sara and Charlie's suggestion, they reluctantly shut their camera off, hoping that this will make the monster chasing them simply give up. The next morning, they turn the camera on to find that Marlo is dead, having apparently been killed somehow in his sleep, and an Operator Symbol inside Milo's car. Milo gets angry at Charlie and Sara for having shut off the cameras, and quickly concludes The Operator got inside the car.

The three go on the run, trying to escape it. Their goal is to discover what happened to Dan and his family. There was no clue of where they went in the tapes, however Charlie's informant manages to tell him that Dan used his money to purchase a home in a new location. The three travel to this spot, and find the house has been burnt down. They locate a storm shelter with electricity and a working camera feed which apparently caught everything going on in the house. They find out that Dan smothered his daughter Tara (Morgan Bastin) and then attempted to choked his wife Rose (Alexandra Holden) to death in a stupor. However, Rose survived Dan's attempt to kill her, and pushed him down a staircase. Dan fell to his death on the stairs, and Rose, clearly stricken with grief, grabbed a red can filled with some kind of fuel, and proceeded to burn the house down, while sitting in the living room clutching her daughter's stuffed rabbit.

Upset that that was all they could find, they go to the local sheriff, who informs them that Rose survived the fire, and that she is locked up in an asylum after murdering her family. The three head straight there and contact Rose, who proceeds to calmly inform them that she believes the monster came into their life because Dan became interested in it. However, when she sees the Operator Symbol on Sara's arm, she attacks her. Sara, Milo and Charlie are forced to leave while medical staff restrain Rose and escort the three out.

Completely out of options, they decide to make a last stand in a cabin. They set the whole place up with cameras, and Charlie suggests that the three of them separate and never meet back up. Since Dan killed his daughter, it shows that they are a danger to each other. Milo interrupts them when he notes that the camera picked up a detail he missed at the hospital: Rose's mark was gone.

The crew are then attacked by The Operator, who flings the back door open and walks inside. Believing that he was the reason The Operator attacked Charlie and Sara and that if he dies, they will be safe, Milo hangs himself with a noose. The Operator seemingly leaves after Milo dies, but Milo's dead body suddenly rises from the ground. It grabs a pipe, and proceeds to knock Charlie down and beat him to death before chasing Sara into the woods. Sara feebly tries to escape both Milo and The Operator, but is caught by Milo. Milo throws Sara back into the house, injuring her. She crawls desperately, too injured to stand and run, and begs Milo to stop. Milo hits her in the head with the pipe, killing her, and then falls to the floor, his eyes a solid white. Moments later, The Operator appears, and his movements seemingly loop. He then vanishes, and Milo's eyes return to normal, implying that he somehow survived.

The movie ends with Dan and Rose leaving a sale, where Dan has purchased a camera with a "college project tape" inside, which is likely the tape of Jamie's death from the beginning of the film.

Cast

Reception

Critical reception for Always Watching was predominantly negative.[5] Dread Central gave the movie a mixed review, writing, "For fans, it will be a fun little bonus story that lets you down in the substance department. For people looking for a fun horror movie, it won’t be super memorable, but will give you a good time. If you don’t think about it too much and just experience it, it is quite fun. As a film/horror nerd, I was let down, but general audiences will like this a whole lot. It did enough interesting to earn my respect, but too much wrong for my adoration. A solid good time, but not a masterpiece."[6]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Clow, Mitchel. "‘Always Watching: A Marble Hornets Story’ movie review: Tell, don’t show". Hypable. Retrieved 26 September 2015.
  2. ↑ HOYLE, BLAIR (8 April 2015). "“Always Watching: A Marble Hornets Story” Review". Cinema Slasher. cinemaslasher.com. Retrieved 9 October 2015.
  3. ↑ "YouTube Horror Series Marble Hornets Will Bring Slenderman To Theaters". Cinema Blend. Retrieved 18 December 2013.
  4. ↑ "Creepy Things That Seem Real But Aren’t: The Marble Hornets Project". Crushable. Retrieved 18 December 2013.
  5. ↑ "ALWAYS WATCHING: A MARBLE HORNETS STORY (2015)". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved 9 October 2015.
  6. ↑ Hentschke, Ted. "Always Watching: A Marble Hornets Story (DVD)". Dread Central. Retrieved 9 October 2015.

External links

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