Film Review: Digging up the Marrow (2014)

Whether you like them or not, it seems that found footage films are here to stay. But instead of sticking to the same formulaic and often tedious approach (documentary crew head off into the middle of nowhere in search of witches/ghosts/mythological beasties), filmmakers are finally coming up with new and inventive ways to approach the subgenre, and Adam Green is one such director.

In meta-documentary Digging up the Marrow, Green plays himself, and it’s a shrewd bit of casting as he looks and sounds just like himself. After a brief introduction in which various well-known members of the horror community are asked about their thoughts on monsters, Green is interviewed in his office about a strange piece of fan mail he recently received from a man called William Dekker. According to the missive, monsters are very real. Not only that, but they are living in the ground beneath us in a place the letter’s author has christened ‘The Marrow’.

Intrigued, and more than a little pleased that Dekker has chosen him to expose the world of The Marrow and the creatures therein, Green sets off with his trusty crew (also playing themselves) to investigate.

Dekker (a great tongue-in-cheek performance by Ray Wise) has some secrets of his own, though, and the further Green and his crew, ahem, dig, the more they start to doubt this strange man’s intentions.

Digging up the Marrow is a lot of fun, and should appeal to fans of Holliston and the Hatchet movies, despite being something of a departure for Green. The creature effects (based on the artwork of Alex Pardee) are strong, and Green’s motives (“I’ve always wanted to believe in monsters, ever since I was a kid.”) are plausible, but what really pushes this film up a notch is genre veteran, Ray Wise, who was given plenty of room to improvise, according to a recent magazine interview. Throw in cameos by Kane Hodder, Tom Holland, and Mick Garris, and you’ve got yourself a fun little movie. And if you enjoy it - though it appears to be dividing opinion amongst genre fans -  there just might be more to come, perhaps in the form of a TV series. I, for one, would welcome it with open arms.

Dir: Adam Green
Starring: Adam Green, Ray Wise, Kane Hodder
DVD Released: 22 June 2015
Classification: 15

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