Bigfoot is back. And this time, he’s not hiding.
Eduardo Sánchez — one half of the duo behind The Blair Witch Project — returns to the found footage genre with Exists, a creature feature that wastes no time getting to the point. I had been following this film for almost a year before it landed, keeping my fingers crossed that it would eventually make it to home video. It did. And I’m glad I waited.
Exists (2014)
The Story: Five friends hit an unknown animal on a dark forest road on the way to a remote cabin. Whatever it was, it remembers.
🎬 Our opinion: The best Bigfoot found footage film ever made — relentless, convincing, and genuinely frightening. Eduardo Sánchez knows exactly what he’s doing. The second half doesn’t breathe.
Director: Eduardo Sánchez · Cast: Samuel Davis, Dora Madison, Chris Osborn
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Powered by JustWatchExists Ranks Among the Best Bigfoot Movies — Whatever IMDB Says
A 5.2 on IMDB. Honestly, don’t let that put you off. Exists is one of those films that mainstream critics dismissed and genre audiences embraced — and the genre audiences were right. The criticism levelled at it — thin characters, generic script — misses the point entirely. This is not a film about character development. It is a film about something enormous in the forest that wants you dead, and on those terms it delivers better than almost anything else in the Bigfoot subgenre.
I’ve watched a lot of Bigfoot films. More than I’d care to admit. And Exists sits at the top of that list — not despite its relentlessness, but because of it. If you want to know where it ranks alongside every other Bigfoot film worth watching, check our full guide to the best Bigfoot movies. The competition isn’t as close as you might think.
What Exists Is About
Five friends plan a weekend of fun at a remote cabin in the woods. The trip starts badly — on the way there, they hit an unknown animal on the road, which promptly disappears into the forest. The group shrugs it off and heads to the cabin. That night, something starts making noise outside. Something large. Something that is not interested in being ignored.
The Exists Trailer
Review: Exists (Spoiler-Free)
What I noticed immediately is that Exists drops you straight into the action. There’s no lengthy setup, no prolonged character introductions, no slow burn that overstays its welcome. The film begins mid-journey — the animal gets hit, the camera catches a brief, blurred glimpse of something in the trees, and the tone is set. I find this approach genuinely refreshing. With found footage films, I don’t need ten minutes of backstory. I want to be pulled into the situation alongside the characters, discovering what’s happening at the same pace they do.
What follows is a masterclass in escalating tension. The early scenes establish an unsettling atmosphere — strange sounds in the dark, glimpses of something that shouldn’t be there — before gradually tightening the screw until the tension becomes almost unbearable. And when Bigfoot finally steps into the light and makes his intentions clear, the blood runs cold. Everything outside the screen disappears. That, at least, was my experience.
One thing that sets Exists apart from most Bigfoot films is how much of the creature you actually see. Where Willow Creek and The Lost Coast Tapes kept their creature largely out of frame — a deliberate, effective choice in its own right — Exists takes the opposite approach. Bigfoot is present, physical, and genuinely threatening. The creature design holds up to scrutiny, which is not something you can say about most entries in the genre.
Did you know?
- The producers deliberately described Exists as a “first-person film” rather than “found footage” — a distinction that reflects the film’s looser approach to the format. Unlike Blair Witch, there’s no pretence that this is recovered evidence. The cameras are just there.
- The Bigfoot costume was performed by Brian Steele — a veteran creature performer whose suit work includes roles in Hellboy, Underworld, and Predators. Having a professional creature performer rather than a stuntman makes a noticeable difference in how the creature moves.
- Despite winning an audience award at SXSW, Exists received largely negative reviews from mainstream critics — most of whom found the characters thin and the script generic. Genre fans disagreed. It’s one of those films where the critical consensus and the audience response tell two completely different stories.
From the midpoint onward, the film barely pauses. The second half is relentless — no recovery time, no false calm, just escalating chaos. I won’t go into specifics, but the film earns everything it asks you to go through. The performances are convincing throughout — I believed these people in a way that found footage films don’t always manage. The moments of confusion, panic, and dark humour all ring true. There are a handful of scenes where the justification for the camera running stretches credibility — a common problem in the genre — but they are few enough that I was willing to forgive them.
One minor complaint: the film briefly incorporates a music score at certain points, which jars against the found footage aesthetic. It’s a small misstep in an otherwise confident production, but worth flagging.
Verdict
Exists is one of the strongest found footage creature features of the last decade — a film that understands the format, respects the genre, and delivers exactly what it promises. Eduardo Sánchez knew what he was doing with Blair Witch, and he hasn’t lost the instinct.
If you love found footage and you haven’t seen Exists yet, fix that tonight.
Where to Watch Exists
Powered by JustWatchSimilar Films to Exists
Similar Films to Exists
The Blair Witch Project (1999) — Eduardo Sánchez’s own masterpiece, and the obvious starting point for anyone who loved Exists. Where Exists shows you the creature, Blair Witch withholds it entirely. Two different philosophies, both effective. Essential viewing.
Willow Creek (2013) — The closest companion piece on this list. Same forest, same legend, completely different approach. Bobcat Goldthwait wrings genuine dread out of almost nothing — no creature budget required. Read our full review.
Trollhunter (2010) — Found footage creature feature done right, this time in the Norwegian wilderness. Deadpan, atmospheric, and considerably more epic in scale than most films in the genre. The finale alone is worth the runtime. See our review of Trollhunter.
Cloverfield (2008) — No Bigfoot, but the same DNA: a handheld camera, an enormous creature, and people running for their lives through terrain they can’t escape. The gold standard of big-budget found footage monster movies. Check out our Cloverfield feature.
The Ritual (2017) — Not found footage, but the closest thing to Exists in terms of tone and setting. Four friends hiking through a Swedish forest encounter something ancient and hostile. Genuinely unsettling, beautifully shot, and one of the strongest creature horror films of the last decade.
