We (the teenagers) are all going to (through) the world's fair (21st century mental issues) "We're all going to the world's fair" popped up in my local cinema as quite the surprise, for such a micro-budget indie horror with many newcomers didn't s seem to fit in the usual repertoire. The concept greatly intrigued me as someone who once upon a time has enjoyed travels down the creepypasta rabbit holes, and still loves the ever-dying found-footage genre and all its little sister genres. Reviews seemed a little suspiciously generous, and so, with certain expectations and prepared for something weird, I went and saw this half-cooked and morally eyebrow-raising experiment that leaves one at least slightly baffled.
Possible future star by the name of Anna Cobb portrays Casey, a character that perhaps only a rather specific audience is welcomed to relate to. As little as the movie tells you, Casey is a lonely, anxious, somber teenager with bad relations with her family and seemingly no friends at all. The story starts with her taking the "World's fair" challenge, which is supposed to affect you psychologically and make you "live in a horror movie". She continues to post videos documenting her life after taking the challenge. The only other significantly large role is that of JLB, a man who watched her videos and grew a questionably huge interest in helping her avoid the vile consequences of world's fair challenge. He is portrayed by Michael J Rogers, who did an excellent job as the villain in Panos Cosmato's equally weird sci-fi nightmare "Beyond the Black Rainbow". Much of the movie's style is established from the very beginning, with long, perhaps too long, scenes of mundane actions, lots of silence, not always building suspense or unease. We follow Casey's state of mind during the couple months after taking the challenge, and it occasionally fires up with something offbeat, but, disappointingly so, as the movie goes on, it moves further away from being about creepypasta-like culture, or any horror games at all for that matter. There are creepy and eerie elements throughout the film via the use of youtube-like playlist, showing off and interpreting what some call the "weird corner" of youtube, where lonely content creators post their bits and pieces from their daily lives and troubled minds.
Major spoiler alert, the ending is what grinds my gears the most, Casey finally answers JLB's obsessive (and never reasoned) wish to help her with stating that everything she's been doing is just an act. Then she calls him a pedophile and leaves. Cut to ending, where we are left with only JLB's perspective, and he tells us a story of how Casey spent a year in assisted medical facility, and they finally met, being very happy and so on. The end. A movie that, to me, promised something other than what it is, then seemed to be about today's teenage mental problems and social/virtual issues, in the end seemed to lose any coherent message or point. A film that made me think and try to figure it out, which I always appreciate, but this one starts to frustrate me the longer I think about it.
Jane Schoenburn has definitely showed some talent by creating a, if not entirely effective, layered or hypnotising, then at the very least an unorthodox and eerie entry in genre with very little general population. David Lowery ("A Ghost Story", "The Green Knight"), by far the biggest name in the credits, saw something here. Some other nice details that I didn't mention, is a minimalistic, but moody original score. It all sums up to a 6/10, and a definite intrigue for what this cast and crew has planned for the future.