Review: ‘Man Finds Tape’ replays found footage tricks

2025 has been a remarkable year for found footage. From Fey to Death Eater and The Man with the Black Umbrella, the subgenre has been operating on all cylinders. And never trust anyone who says found footage is dead. Thankfully, you can now add co-writers and co-directors Peter Hall and Paul Gandersman’s Man Finds Tape to the stack of found-footage films that excel at making your skin crawl. With their debut feature, the filmmakers show a clear adoration for the genre through a deep understanding of conventions while also delivering a few tricks and treats of their very own.

William Magnuson plays Lucas, your typical investigative YouTuber who explores the weird and wonderful. In a previous investigation, he claimed to have uncovered a videotape of him sleeping as a child with a shadowy entity leering from the darkness. After alleging that Reverend Endicott Carr (John Gholson) was somehow involved, he later withdrew his assertions and sought forgiveness from his loyal fanbase.

A wholly different mystery soon arrives on his doorstep, and perhaps out of a need for redemption, he launches an investigation into surveillance video that shows the murder of a local in his hometown of Larkin, Texas. Trouble is, no one can remember what happened. Whenever Lucas shows the video to anyone, they immediately blackout. Lucas then ropes in his sister Lynn (Kelsey Pribilski) for a journey into hell—leading to the occult and a disturbing legend about a monster stalking the residents. A series of clues guides Lucas and Lynn into an alarming den of lies and secrets that could very well rip the town apart. The descent into suffocating madness is dangerously methodical, and as the siblings peel back the layers like an onion, something far more sinister than they could have anticipated awaits.

Hall and Gandersman craft such a compelling and deeply personal story that’s anchored by Magnuson’s and Pribilski’s captivating lead performances, in addition to Gholson’s truly unsettling turn. Their instinctual choices pair well with a taut script that worms under the fingernails, also owed to effective camera work that seems to capture death in a bottle. It’s quite easy for found footage films to blend together, but Man Finds Tape stands out from the pack with imagery so terrifying that it’ll guarantee a few nightmares.

The film also digs its heels into themes of brainwashing and fanaticism. Perhaps unintentionally, Man Finds Tape feels like an urgent plea not to succumb to misinformation or look away from the trainwreck developing right before your eyes. In these modern times, it’s quite common for religious sects to misconstrue ancient texts for their rotten agendas. With Man Finds Tape, Gandersman and Hall plant, water, and nurture this idea until the fingernail-peeling finale.

Man Finds Tape hits theaters and digital this Friday (December 5).