How New Found Footage Captures Our Desperation To Be Liked Online
I never expected Chris Vander Kaay’s found footage horror film .ask to rattle me as much as it did. When I walked away from that first viewing, I felt a seismic shift quake through my body. And I didn’t understand why. It wasn’t until days later that I realized the filmmaker had perfectly captured the existential tragedy of living most of your life online. Through its familiar story (a man seeking validation through his YouTube channel), Vander Kaay wields a thematic anvil about the desperation to be liked and what it means to leave a mark on the world.
Playing a fictionalized version of himself, Vander Kaay brings charm to the screen as a YouTuber who wants to take his self-actualization channel to the next level. He offers advice and encouragement through candid videos shot entirely on his iPhone. Like many self-proclaimed influencers, he makes his life appear better than it really is. Through faking events (i.e. pretending he’s a guest speaker and going on all-expenses-paid trips to posh, secluded resorts), he envisions the life he wants. While Vander Kaay seems like a good guy, this approach comes across as extremely disingenuous, stunting his channel growth and upward trajectory.
While attending an entrepreneurial conference, he receives a mysterious business card embellished with a URL. When he enters it into his computer, he’s taken to a landing page where he can sign up for a free consultation. He enters his contact info on a whim, because what does he have to lose at this point? He’s willing to take the risk. He soon finds himself speaking to an unknown man completely shrouded in darkness, like one of those crime shows when a witness prefers to remain anonymous. Despite this obvious red flag, Vander Kaay stays on the phone while the supposed businessman tells him exactly what he can do to take his career to the next level. He needs to be totally honest with his viewers, the man says, and express all the doubts and anxieties he keeps hidden.
Vander Kaay posts an emotional video on his channel and sees immediate results. His follower count and traffic go through the roof. He continues taking the businessman’s advice, and life takes a hard left turn. In his new-found authenticity, he begins to manifest certain things (i.e. a house of his own) that become reality. But it all comes with a heavy price tag that he’s just not ready to pay. His desperation skewed his view. He forgot who he was and lost sight of the bigger picture – without questioning that it was all too good to be true. He wanted to be liked, accepted, and validated so badly that he was willing to do anything.
And that’s just the exhaustive nature of the digital world. We, collectively, exist online as copies of ourselves, sacrificing bits and pieces to get people to like us. My digital copy began in the late ‘90s when I joined various MSN and AOL chat rooms. It was the new frontier.
My family got a home computer in 1999, a time of great change for me. I was 13 and undergoing a flood of new hormones. An impressionable young teen, I turned to the vastness of the internet as a way to find human connection (think: We’re All Going to the World’s Fair) and goof off with my friends. Diving into the corners of message boards and chats proved to be both thrilling and terrifying. Talking with an older teen from across the country was so exciting! A/S/L, they’d ask, and then we’d chat about everything from school and dating to our favorite movies and TV shows.
You can tell a lot about how someone sees themselves in digital spaces—opting to play pretend and become someone else altogether. Especially in those days, most of us remained anonymous and hid behind avatars. In slipping into someone else’s skin, you could manifest things you wanted – like relationships (my BFF at the time dated someone across the country) and adoration from strangers. The more chats you participated in, the more you felt validated and liked. And the more “friends” you made, the bigger your ego. When one “friend” disappeared from your life, you chatted more and more. It was a vicious cycle. If narcissist Elon Musk’s Twitter annihilation has taught us anything, it’s that the worst among us feed on the desperation of others.
In recent years, found footage emerged as the genre most willing to experiment and tackle similar themes. Lance Todd’s Beyond the North Woods (2022) penetrates time and space, as it tells the tale of an obnoxious influencer who heads to the secluded woods in Minnesota for his new video. Searching for clues about a string of unexplained disappearances, he doesn’t see the signs right before his eyes. The YouTuber, drawing parallels to Logan Paul, soon succumbs to powers beyond his control and tumbles into a time loop, where he must figure out the truth before it’s too late. His distress over achieving his next viral video leads to nothing but devastation and his tragic downfall.
Co-directors Oliver Mauldin and Jacques Edeline unlock a comparable storyline. #MissingCouple (2024) arrives as one of the year’s creepiest surprises. A couple trades their city lives for the country after renting a cabin in the woods. Nature sweeps out in all directions, giving them the peace and seclusion they’ve desperately been needing. While clearing their heads, they continue filming videos about country life, such as planting their own garden and growing their own food. But while they settle into their new home, a figure lurks in the shadows and begins taunting them, secretly entering the house at night, and generally being a nuisance.
Despite these early red flags, they decide to stay a few more days and mount cameras and motion-sensor lights around the cabin. But nothing squelches their unease—and it’s already too late to go for help. In their desire to grow their online brand, they sacrifice their sanity and their bodies to an unknown force growing in the woods.
This year, we’ve also been gifted with Michelle Iannantuono’s Livescreamers, the follow-up to 2018’s Livescream, the latter which nosedives into streamer Scott’s (Gunner Willis) discovery that he gives one user a reason to live. During a haunted gameplay, one viewer expresses how much his videos have helped them get up in the morning and continue through life. Taken aback, Scott replies with humble gratitude. He’s floored by the confession; he’s never thought his silly little streams would mean so much to people. His desperation to be accepted fed that of others, leading to a codependent relationship. Scott needs fans, and (at least) one fan needs him to survive.
Found footage possesses a raw vulnerability other genres just don’t have. Evoking a grave hopelessness in our online identities, these films, in particular, evoke an overwhelming regret that we’ve poured too much of our time and energy into being our most perfect selves. We’ve wasted so many hours stressing and worrying about what others think of us. Black mirrors reflect our soul, and no manner of reposts, likes, and shares will satiate a deep-seated hunger to be validated by strangers. It can eat you alive if you let it.
With social media throttling ideas and diverse perspectives, perhaps it’s time to unplug and reconnect with the things that actually matter. Our real selves need nurturing. Take up a hobby, adopt a pet in need, or watch your favorite comfort horror movies. The possibilities to recharge are endless. Even though social media remains critical to work and our everyday lives, we don’t have to let it consume us. We can wield it to our own benefit through finding community, starting a Discord, and allowing ourselves to be as honest as we possibly can.
Becoming immortalized online, we’ve come to rely on these platforms to fill empty holes in our chests—but we may never find what we’re looking for. All we can do is hope it’s all been worth it.
Categorized:Editorials
