While the whole people on a reality show having the tables turned concept is recycled by now, “My Little Eye” has managed to master such a concept with a brilliant horror thriller that is just undeniably engrossing from start to finish. From the opening credits, we can already see the director playing games with the audience by filming the entire scroll of the Universal logo and the entire film in general in digital form resembling a web cast. We never once, throughout the entire movie, see a shot filmed with an actual movie camera, yet instead look only through the eyes of the cameras watching this group of people. Essentially, “My Little Eye” borders on the routine; different people brought together, they clash, there are your bumps and creaks, but eventually, as the movie goes on, it becomes increasingly intelligent in its searing undertones and social commentary.
These five characters are average, completely opposite people we get to emphasize with without ever dragging down the film. The film goes about itself as a real session of a web cast, we see constant camera angles from a hidden camera somewhere in the room, and the dialogue between the characters is so candid it’s almost scary. This basically isn’t just characters under a microscope, it’s the current state of humanity, the money-grubbing, low-life, voyeuristic, exhibitionist humanity we’ve become. As the “reality” goes on, suddenly things seem awry. There are bumps and creaks in the middle of the night, they’re receiving strange, sometimes sick packages, and with no communication from the outside world, they begin to wonder: Who’s watching them exactly?
The film often continues on its barrage of just engrossing character emphasis and build-up that just keeps mounting as the tension becomes thicker and thicker between characters. Most people will be inclined to compare this as a sort of “Blair Witch Project,” but I just couldn’t help compare this to the likes of “Das Experiment,” because in the end, each character presents a different picture, a different aspect of humanity, while the story dares to put human behavior and psychosis under the microscope with its hopelessly taut story. After the events that take place in the film, the message becomes loud and clear, “Is this any sicker than what you’ll usually watch on television?” What unfathomable lengths will they resort to? Writer David Hilton tailors an engrossing thriller that relies on human psychology to provide the horror, and do the game for us, while exploring real horrors.
The atmosphere from director Evans relies mostly on sounds and silence and we’re never exposed to overly audible theme music to help increase the mood and really adds to the realism. As the film progresses slowly, we begin to see that whoever is watching them, they know them too well, and such a notion is further increased with some excellent camera shots that just pack a punch with the story. In a great homage to “2001,” they seek to converse in a “safe zone booth” where they can’t be seen, but are dead wrong. The utterly surprising and disturbing finale that really reminded me of “Saw,” and makes the final defining statement about what the movie means and what it’s trying to say. Its excellent films like “My Little Eye” that come out of nowhere that keep my eyes on the low-budget horror film circuit constantly.