The concept of found footage, where celluloid or video evidence left behind tells the story of a movie, has worked very well in horror films like The Blair Witch Project. Now can it work in a comedy?
Well, that’s the premise of Project X, the latest comedy by Todd “The Hangover” Phillips.
The trailer begins with a kid addressing his parents on a video he made pointing the camera himself: “Mom…dad…where do I start? This was supposed to be a small get together. I wanted to be cool for a night. I wanted girls to notice me. Then things got a little out of control…”
You can just imagine the rest from those famous last words.
I went to quite a few ragers in high school that reminded me of what I saw in Superbad, and now it’s a logical step to do it where everyone could document it with their cell-phones, not to mention doing the found footage idea in a Hangover/Superbad format is an interesting twist.
According to Collider, Project X was a temporary, top secret style title that stuck, and it’s low budget, in the $12-15 million range, which fits the low tech idea of one person filming everything, and seeing it from their point of view.
As New York Magazine also pointed out, the R rating makes the film sound pretty promising as well: “Crude and sexual content throughout, nudity, drugs, drinking, pervasive language, reckless behavior, and mayhem – all involving teens.”
Hell, if I was making a raunchy teen comedy, that’s the kind of rating I’d definitely pray for from the MPAA.
