Barry Levinson Jumps Into Found Footage Genre with ‘The Bay’

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Rating: 3.0/5.0

CHICAGO – Perhaps the last person I would have expected to leap into the found footage genre made so popular in films like “Paranormal Activity” is the director of character-driven pieces like “Diner” and “Avalon” and yet here’s Barry Levinson’s “The Bay,” opening today, November 9, 2012 at the Music Box Theatre in Chicago. Levinson’s understanding of character elevates what could have been an absolute disaster but can’t save the film from its genre failures and lack of tension. It’s interesting but forgettable and sometimes frustrating.

The conceit of “The Bay” is that we’re watching a film cobbled together by a journalist and a team who want to expose “what really happened” in the small seaside town of Claridge over the Fourth of July weekend in which hundreds of residents died in gruesome ways. Using news reports from the day, home movies, and footage shot by a pair of Oceanographers who stumble across the genetic anomaly of the century buried in the water, “The Bay” has an interesting structure even if the set-up often fails the “why would they be filming this” test of found footage films. (It also fails the “why would they cut this together like a horror movie with slo-mo and loud music” test.)

The Bay
Photo credit: Roadside Attractions

“The Bay” is pretty simple – there are parasites in that water and the steroids that have been given to the chickens in the town of Claridge that have then run off into the water through their droppings have made those little bloodsuckers into man-killers. There may have been warnings for months; warnings ignored by the Mayor and other people in power. However, there are no warnings for the locals. One minute, they’re having a crab-eating contest and enjoying the dunk tank on a beautiful holiday. The next minute, said crab eaters are throwing up their insides and the dunk-ee looks like she’s melting. Levinson and his team spare nothing in terms of the ick factor. “The Bay” will gross you out.

At its best, “The Bay” works because of Levinson’s understanding of “average people in an average town.” The scenes of people trying to communicate with loved ones over Skype or through their smartphones have a palpable sadness. These seem like real people who become increasingly aware that their situation is not going to have a happy ending. Watching a girl communicate with her friend about the lesions growing on her body or footage of a doctor talking to the CDC about an epidemic for which they are clearly not prepared has a deep sadness that is often a missing ingredient in horror.

The Bay
Photo credit: Roadside Attractions

However, it doesn’t have much tension. Even at 85 minutes, “The Bay” gets a little repetitive and predictable. We know things are going to go bad the minute a woman starts screaming in the street and so the rest of the film becomes something of an experiment in human torture. The only “will they or won’t they” tension comes from a pair (Christopher Denham & Kristen Connolly) travelling to Claridge via boat to visit family for the holiday. You want to scream at them to turn around and definitely to not go swimming. These passages are the most effective. Conversely, seeing the reporter (Kether Donohue) speak repeatedly about the parasite gets numbing in its inevitability and lack of interest in her character.

“The Bay” is a unique entry in the found footage genre not merely because it’s directed by an Oscar winner. It’s more of a mockumentary in that it plays like a journalistic investigation of an ecological horror. While the structure allows for some unique storytelling, it also kind of drains the piece of actual tension, making it more of a message film about bureaucracy, corruption, and environmental tampering, than a true horror movie.

By BRIAN TALLERICO Content Director HollywoodChicago.com brian@hollywoodchicago.com