Some while later, three of them are found dead and mutilated in a remote house along with some inconclusive but sinister footage. Main host Riley Brennan (Sarah Durn) and their second camera is never found.
Now twelve years later, Riley's older sister Mia (Camille Sullivan) who has never got over this, is working with a new team of true crime videographers making a documentary in the hope it will keep the search alive.
No good will come of this.
CW: implied sexual assault, suicide and a little violence
The found footage aspect and imagery has seen this compared to The Blair Witch Project but Chris Stuckmann's crowdfunded horror debut is both more interesting than just doing that and also kind of disappointing.
It starts as the true crime episode under production then smoothly morphs with a cut to the exercise of filming it. Then the past suddenly intrudes with a bang and Mia picks up the investigation into Riley's disappearance again.
Some of it is really nicely done but there's a bit of a believability problem around the passage of twelve years and what unfolds. Is time flowing differently for Mia? There's a hint of this in the dialogue and it has a theme of premonitions, fate and circularity. Much of what we see Mia uncover is stuff that could have happened shortly after her sister first disappeared and some of it is "because it now wants to be found" but I call bullshit.
As events move to a confrontation things get a bit OTT and while I liked the final section the second half is just not as satisfying as the excellent first. A mixed bag, 6/10 but must be applauded for being delivered for next to nothing in movie budget terms.