Dashcam 2021 * Star

SLAP DASH

How bad is 2021's Dashcam? Let me put it this way, how bad is rabies? Nuff said. Dashcam is billed as a horror film but hold up, it's also one of those handheld, found footage movies. Ugh. Dated, tasteless, impudent, and not even scary, Dashcam has its director (Rob Savage) stuck in old hat land, floundering. 

Jittery as all get-out, Dashcam is distributed by Momentum Pictures. That's funny. This flick has uh, no momentum, no sense of the visual, and no continuity to speak of. The vehicle is edited so poorly, the scares (that you can't really see) come out of nowhere and they're jump scares that Savage can't even set up well (the dude needs lessons). Dashcam was obviously inspired by those Blair Witch and Paranormal Activity movies. What it lacks is any redeemable features or sense of plotting that those pics had in their heyday. 

Dashcam tops out at 80 minutes and the last 10 or so has its putrid lead (Annie Hardy, the poor man's Heather Donahue) doing improv rapping at the wheel of her car (and doing it badly). In truth, I've never hated a main character more and the fact that she survives the ordeal (otherwise there'd be no movie) just shows the misguided vision that helmer Savage insisted on. Watching Dashcam, you wonder if everyone involved wanted you to hate it. Probably. That's one messed up wink wink at the audience. 

Dashcam is about a livestreaming dolt (Hardy) who flies to London to see friends only to get terrorized by possessed demons with plenty of blood and other crap (pun intended) foaming everywhere. Dashcam gives new meaning to the term "handheld" because you literally can't comprehend what you're seeing. I mean the definition of a motion picture is a series of still photographs on film projected onto a screen using light in rapid succession. So OK, is Dashcam any of these things? I would say 99 percent nada. Make a swift "dash" to avoid Dashcam. 

Written by Jesse Burleson