Very well executed

Gripping story with well-crafted characters

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

The movie is wonderful and true, an act of love in all its contradictions and complexity

MIM, I would say, is a movie that would give a few parents nightmares for nights to follow, but it's a movie that every parent should see. First off, dispel the negative reviews. This is one of those films like Wolf Creek, for example, that's still turning around my head, again because of the so real situation, but girls meets a worse fate than Mick Taylor. Two girls, best friends become victims of an internet serial child predator, passing himself off as this young surfer dude, who looks like someone out and Home And Away. Megan is this very popular high school girl, the one that everyone loves and respect. Her best friend, Amy is the other end, sensible, outcast, virginal type, who Megan's friends and other people make fun of. Girls can be so mean, and besides Amy, I didn't like any of these other girls, while not regarding Megan very highly either. But with the masks removed, these are how real girls act, or are they cliche's from other 2000+ films. The way it's shot, using less lighting, really worked making it come across as a Gregory Dark film, while the first half of the film, feels very much like Larry Clark. Some inventive touches were great too, like the reenactment, of Megan's abduction, sprouting some amusing moments, on part of the actor's sake here. Also the news bulletin segment of film, again coaxing me into the belief these were real characters. That's what Blair Witch, did. But even though fictional, in this film, they couldn't be closer than the truth. With the two girls here, who I first believed to be real people, it had me at a bit of alarm, when judging by the dates of the disappearance, where one month later, here in Adelaide. February 2007, a young girl, Carly Ryan,, another victim of an anonymous internet sicko, was murdered. The last twenty minutes of the girls's terror and torture here, is a hard watch, where the killer has taken them to his lair in the woods. His face has been kept hidden, and some images in this last part of movie, involving blood and death, won't sit well with a few. The lengthy Amy begging/digging scene is one of the most affectingly disturbing and discomforting scenes I've ever seen. It just goes on and on, you really want it to stop. Although Megan Is Missing isn't the greatest film ever made, this good film, is an educational drama, and warrants viewing from parents and teens. The three stars are good too, especially the girls, our lead with a bolstering performance. The way the movie's constructed and told, I really liked, again the early as with dialogue, it was very Larry Clark'ish. Like Thirteen, River's Edge, whatever, this is one of the more important teen films.

Megan Is Missing is the fictional account of two young girls who are seduced and kidnapped by a online predator. As a fan of mockumentaries and found footage films, I'd have to say that this ranks up there with some of the best ones in the horror genre. Mainly because it's very, deeply, incredibly unsettling. From a gore perspective, it's rather tame. There is not a single scene that shows someone actually being killed. It's mainly the aftermath that you see. I found that the way this story was told was brilliant, to be honest. Its relatively minimalist approach to backstory exposition, particularly regarding Megan's abuse as a child, is incredibly effective in establishing the causes for some of her extremely questionable actions in this film. She does things that are arguably nonsensical, but when she explains how she was molested as a ten year old by her camp counselor (in EXCRUCIATINGLY harrowing detail), you kind of understand why she does those things. Speaking of acting, I see reviews that chide the performances based mainly on decisions the girls and their friends make. They seem to forget that these are supposed to be relatively clueless teenage girls, and by default are SUPPOSED to make stupid decisions. Amber Perkins as Amy Herman is particularly good in her portrayal of an innocent 13-year old girl, convincing even as the horrible things that happen to her during the last act are happening. You really feel sorry for her as she pleads for her life, rather convincingly.And that last act...sheesh.Starting with the two photos of Megan that were found on the fake fetish website in the S & M contraption, broken, bruised, bloody, absolutely TERROR-STRICKEN...those all-too-brightly-lit pictures, coupled with what the film conveys about how evil the antagonist is, had me stunned. The stark, exposed, abject vulnerability in her eyes is something that sticks with me even as I type this.Also, the way the antagonist breaks the spirit and will of Amy in the final act is positively soul crushing. The part when he rapes her is as deplorable as anything I've seen in Irreversible, I Spit On Your Grave or Blindness. As a parent to a thirteen year old girl, this movie was really hard to watch. I recommend it to anyone who is a fan of found footage horror. Very, very, very disturbing stuff.

Before I saw anything, I'll start by saying that his movie was written, edited, and directed by Michael Goi, the president of the American School of Cinematography. Somehow, despite all of his knowledge, he still ends making one of the worst movies I've ever seen. Shame on you Goi.Megan Is Missing involves a teen who goes missing due to something she does on the internet. The film is shot in an in-screen only technique, later made famous by Unfriended. The kids in this movie are unlikable brats, and the "realistic" dialogue they have is so over- the-top that it becomes the most unrealistic dialogue in film history. I am fully aware that teens swear up storms and it is nice to see a movie that realizes that. However, kids do not talk the way they do in this movie. In one very unintentionally disturbing scene, a young girl talks about how she preformed fellatio on an older camp councilor, and she starts spitting snot on his penis while she starts choking. According to Goi, this is a "word-for-word" discussion she had with a real child, and the scene goes on for like seven minutes. There are several scenes that do this; over-the-top dialogue for seven minutes before going to the next over-the-top dialogue for seven minutes. It becomes the most boring film ever made, as basically nothing happens until the last 10 minutes. There is also the singlemost worst news broadcast scene I've ever witnessed, with newscasters wearing T-shirts and transitions consisting of Windows MovieMaker-esque card flips and scene wipes.The film ends with the second worst rape scene I've ever seen (only beaten by Paradox Alice). The actress is not crying and doesn't appear to be struggling, she only whines while being raped. She is then tossed into a barrel and buried alive, and the audio of her crying becomes muffled after one scoop of dirt is dumped on top of her. Stuff like this is laden all throughout the movie. But more importantly, this film proves what is wrong with society. People see a child swearing or a child getting raped, they immediately deem it as "realistic" and "horrifying", even if it is done laughably. Michael Goi is one of the world's most sought- after cinematographers in the industry, how could he make a movie so boring, stupid, inconsistent, and terrible?

I think people are being a bit overreactionary and unfair with the one star ratings. Yeah, this was low budget and the script could have been better. I thought the dialogue was a little annoying and vapid but honestly, I remember a lot of my teenager talks being on the shallow side, so maybe it's an accurate portrayal. But even though it looked a bit amateur, overall I thought it did a fair-to-good job for what it set out to do while still being entertaining. The director was up front in saying he aimed to make this a warning about online predators. Given the subject matter, this could easily have been exploitative + gratuitous. I think it refrained from doing that, so kudos. I really don't agree with those who have said the "warning" theme to the movie is just an excuse to show the raping of a fourteen year old. That scene focuses only on Amy's face the entire time, and the only viewer who would see that as exciting or as anything other than heartbreaking and angering is a sociopath already, and there are many other, sicker films that they would probably "enjoy" (blech) instead of this one. That said, the movie still banks highly on suspense and cultural morbid curiosity about predators, kidnapping, sexual assault and other violence. I don't like torture porn movies, but this one is based on true accounts,(actual pictures and footage were part of the research) and I thought it important to really get a glimpse into what those victims went through. While I thought the characters a bit shallow, (and FTR I think a lot of teenagers IRL are kind of shallow) there was decent enough backstory and character development to make me care about them. As has been said by many already, the last twenty minutes are really sad and hard to watch, but it was pretty ingenious-- for instance, showing the complete last moments of Amy's life instead of abbreviating it or cutting to different scenes. Some people have complained about how tedious it was, but this wasn't meant to be an action movie. It showed what an eternal agony Amy felt. And the very last scene is just totally heartbreaking.Deal with the cringe worthy moments. This movie is worth watching.