My Top 5 Mockumentary Horror Movies

Documentary is style of film that doesn’t put emphasis on the role of actors but witnesses to a

tragedy, and so utilizing interviews sort of style to capture the horror. Documentary is a genre that

usually covers real world crimes. Mockumentary expands on the style used by its predecessor

and utilizes the handheld camera perspective. The shaky camera mockumentary brings adds tension and dread to the scene. In many movies, there is always that one particular scene where the film’s point of view by way of a camera just gets dropped and left behind by the owner and we are only shown the legs of the them. Or sometimes the camera is left behind, mimicking a real tragic event caught on camera. This style is a signature within the genre, and it adds a major defining in point in authenticity.

Below are my top 5 documentary/mockumentary films:

1. Lake Mungo (2008)

Lake Mungo is a story about a ghost of a young teenage girl named Alice Palmer who haunts her

family. The cause of her restless soul was apparently linked to how she died, drowning in lake

Mungo. But the plot twist happens when the apparatiton was revealed to be a fabrication by

Alice’s brother, Matthew. The second plot twist was arguably one of the most uncommon twist

and it’s a future sight of Alice of her own death in lake Mungo. The film was majorly done in an

investigate interview style, managing to question the audience whether it is real or not.

2. Hell House LLC II: The Abaddon Hotel (2018)

The hell house series revolved around the haunted hotel used by a satanic cult with its leader, Andrew Tully, where he and his followers commited suicide before the start of the series. The

second entry introduces us to the man who would the major antagonist of the film. The film was

majorly dominated by a broadcast televised news interview of three people. One was a county

magistrate of where the Abaddon was in, and the other two was a horror documentary director

and a supernatural investigator or a ghost hunter. The plot twist that the magistrate was Tully all

along was brilliantly done. The climax scene of the film, where the former director of horror

documentary film got trapped in the house and tortured by Tully and the ghosts of his followers

opened up more questions as to what exactly was Andrew Tully.

3. Conversation With a Killer: Jeffrey Dahmer (2022)

Sometimes, documentary gives you a real sense of dread more than the generic horror plot of

running away from a crazed killer. This is the case for the Comversation With a Kiler series

where they cover the details of the people involved in the crimes of these individuals such as

journalists, lawyers, defense attorney, doctors, etc. Conversation With a Killer reveals Dahmer’s

true perspectives of his crimes and it’s authentic unlike other series of Dahmer like Dahmer and

My Friend Dahmer. The reason why I picked Dahmer, and not Bundy or Gacy was because how different Dahmer was from the typical psychopathic killers, devoid of emotional empathy, and the lack of distinct separation between good and evil. Dahmer was unique because he was straight up honest, and knew that he was sick. He also knew the distinction between what‘s good and what’s evil.

4. Spree (2020)

Spree is a brilliant mockumentary film perfectly capturing the dark comedy aspect of a horror. It is about a content creator named Kurt falling short onviewers. He resorted to other methods like ubering where he live-streamed his activity. The

length in which he went through to gain more views on his live was utterly depraved. The

infatuation with views commited him to the act of murder of his passengers, like poisoning,

crash onto them, and other forms of killing, all the while smiling and carrying his day like a

normal person. Spree is a reminder to the side effects of over fixation with gaining fame in social

media and it hits hard especially for Gen Z.

5. Faces of Death (1978)

Faces of Death was a highly disturbing compilations of deaths, combining real tragedies and

fictional into one to create the impression of showing actual deaths around the world. Numbers

of graphic deaths that has a significant amount of gore were later confirmed to be fake though it

wouldn’t change the fact that it still gives you the dreadful feeling. It is a highly disturbing movie

that captures the essence that death is a part of a human stage and it’s normal. It presents death in

a detached way.