3. Unfriended (2014) and Unfriended: Dark Web (2018)

While the found footage genre often relies on characters carrying their cameras (despite audiences sometimes wanting them to put the damn thing down and run!), it’s trickier to sustain excitement when the footage comes from a (mostly) stationary computer. But Unfriended manages to do just that. During a Skype conversation, a group of teenagers are haunted by a student they bullied before she took her own life. This creative approach makes us afraid of potential threats lurking behind them in the dark, away from the brightness of their screen. The film cranks up the tension and dread as we witness their baffled responses to the horror happening in real time. Even something as minor as Skype freezing can be twisted into a frightening moment.

Unfriended: The Dark Web is a completely unrelated story, but just as scary. It exposes the seedier side of the internet with snuff films and deep fakes, in many ways predicting the dark path we may be headed down with AI. Both Unfriended films cleverly update the found footage concept for our screen-addicted lives. Maybe a TikTok horror movie is in the future?