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At first, when I saw that it was one of those films made with footage from web cams and handhelds, I cursed the found footage genre and was ready to be disappointed. After watching it, I must say I am glad I did and that people responsible for the low IMDb rating didn't really watch the movie. The truth is that this is not really a found footage film, but a documentary type of horror. The premise is that some government secreted video footage has leaked to someone who montaged them in order to show "what really happened". And what happened is a biological outbreak. The film is trying to be realistic and it manages to do that, while the slow pace that some accused works perfectly for the film's ultimate and terrifying outcome. Bottom line: I will keep this film in my permanent collection. I don't know what people that rated it 1 smoked, but it was probably infested by parasites :-) It may also have been the setting for me: a slow night with no one around, perfect for watching horror. If you are tired of dumb monster movies and boring killer in the woods crap, this is the film for you.

It is very clear that the reviewer only watch the trailer and not the film, since the film is not about zombies. This is a rare, and great mockumentary, about 10 mins in you will feel that you are watching a real documentary, instead of same old found footage garbage. The film is nicely edited, and footage very well organized, and they seem so real, you are gonna forget it's all fake. Personally I don't usually go for this kind of film, but this one surprised me, it's more drama than horror, but still scary or gory enough for the horror fans. Great film with horror elements, and very strong envirmental message, give it a try, you wont regret it.

First, I want to say this is the most disturbing found footage film I have ever seen. Watching the horror film "THE BAY" today, 30 minutes in and I'm thinking, this feels like a real documentary, but in a good way, because I've said that before about a horror movie and not in a good way, (Poughkeepsie Tapes), but this movie is able to convey a sense of environmental awareness in a way that isn't corny (Cabin Fever), because believe it or not, there are real concerns people don't pay much attention to when it comes to how they live, what they buy to clean their clothes, to feed themselves and their children, they don't understand the chemicals they use, the chemicals used in plastics, how heat leeches those chemicals into what they drink and eat, the packaging, the effects of those chemicals we now know to stunt the growth of fetal brain tissue, effectively dumbing down generations of people, yes, the chemical I speak of is found in 99% of all pregnant women, because they don't start using BPA free materials until they get pregnant or until after they have the baby, and the chemical has already done its damage... we're talking about real dangers that effect human genetics, and development. Hopefully this movie will be taken a bit seriously, and people will consider how they spend their money, what they put in and on our bodies. I've been saying this for years, and every day more and more people are taking their power back in the way they spend their hard earned money, because everyone wants to be healthy and happy, but to be so, you must choose to be informed, don't take my word for it, research for yourself, the facts are all out there. I rated THE BAY a solid 8/10 I think it's far better than the ratings here on IMDb, and feel it's hugely underrated and misjudged. The acting is incredibly realistic, the content is relevant, visceral, really effective without becoming cliché, cheesy, or silly. Good luck, and kind regards, Jonathan Berman Kittysafe

For a movie that claims to be somehow similar to the Paranormal franchise this is pretty decent. While it still has the obvious flaws (convinience of the "found footage", sound enhancement for some of the horror/shock moments), it does convince with its "story". Plus while it may sound very strange and out there, this is actually more believable than haunting houses, because it actually dives into science (if you'll excuse the pun I'm using). The acting is OK, the script isn't the best, but overall I liked that it underplayed the main theme, rather than being too on the nose. The effects were good too, characters not acting "rational" is something we almost grew accustomed to.

Like its concept, "The Bay" is unclear mess of turbid water and bunch of ideas that swarm around with no reason. What a crowd of specific people we see? Chicken lovers? Water engineers of some kind? Water biologists? Doctors? Policemen? Eco-terrorists? Vegans? Journalists? Newscasters? Really, that's a question I repeated to myself while watching "The Bay". There's no drama because personal stories are so short and superficial that you don't have enough time to memorize names only that stupid screams "oh my, something is wrong with me". Sure, dude, you are playing in this mess, that's really wrong. Did you have a chance to read a scenario before? May be this movie for horror lovers...But no, there isn't fear just utter mess. I like Cloverfield for its dramatic story mixed-up with horror sci-fi and shown in similar "live cam" - like style, but "The Bay" is far from that, somewhere in turbid water.

A small town on the coast of Maryland has a bizarre outbreak of some kind in the middle of their 4th of July festivities. The symptoms are strange, disgusting, and quickly don't add up. The hospital can't figure out what it is. Within 24 hours the town is in chaos, surrounded by the national guard, and quarantined. A small town novice reporter was on scene covering the 4th of July and she describes what happened with the help of her own camera footage as well as other digital evidence pieced together from a variety of sources. It has some of that Blair Witch camera work which I normally despise, but for this documentary style flick it worked really well and I think this is the best example of its genre I've seen. The thing about this is that once we come to understand the origin of this outbreak it sounds like something that really could happen. The chain of events that cascaded into this disaster was surprisingly complex and at the same time very on point with the risks industrialization poses to the environment and to us! I don't think I've seen a threat in a horror movie this well thought out in many years. It all made sense once you understood what was happening but it definitely comes out of a blind spot in the horror realm. This is not simply a mutated flesh eating infection, a curse, or anything quite so simple but neither does it have the histrionic level drama that some horror junkies need these days. This is weird horror in the realm of the real. I never thought I'd say this, but I was glad when I found little discrepancies in the portrayal of the collapse of the infrastructure, hospital and police procedures, etc. While watching it, my mind was going into overdrive trying to find reasons that 'this isn't real; this really couldn't happen like this.' There were a couple of scenes that were chilling in how similar they were to actual news stories. I felt an emotional outpouring of sympathy for the victims. It was like watching one of these catastrophes like hurricane Katrina or hurricane Sandy where you just feel so bad for the people involved. Of course the difference was this was a bit more bloody and once you come to understand the nature of the biological danger it goes to a whole new level of revulsion. I kind of wanted to see holes in it to find some respite from the growing anxiety. I felt like some of those holes were there in a couple of gratuitous shock value scenes that fell a little flat, and in the response from the government. But when you look at the lack of response hurricane Katrina got in the first 24 hours…maybe one of those holes isn't so big after all, though the conspiracy-style cover-up in the movie was a bit much. All in all, this film will make your skin crawl!

When I first heard about The Bay, it just sounded like another creature feature. It might be fun, although I was skeptical of the found footage aspect. I became a lot more interested when I heard that Barry Levinson was the director. I loved his work on Homicide: Life on the Street and wanted to see what a respected director would do with this genre. What I got was the most disturbing movie I've seen in years. Rather than doing the typical found footage approach of someone uncovering and watching film made by dead people, dating all the way back to Cannibal Holocaust, Levinson wisely frames the movie as a documentary composed of leaked classified footage. This approach gives the film a sense of verisimilitude from the get go, especially in this age of Wikileaks. Levinson also uses the documentary format to avoid one of the major pitfalls of found footage movies-over reliance on shaky cams. The footage in the film comes from various sources, ranging from security cameras to a professional cameraman wandering through town with a reporter. Where the film actually features shaky cam footage, it is used to great effect, as when a digital camera malfunctions during a violent scene, making it that much more disturbing. The film's greatest asset is how disturbingly real it feels. The film is by no means intended as a scientific treatise, but it ties in actual environmental issues such as run off from factory farming, making it feel all too plausible. In the beginning, the juxtaposition of gruesome imagery with a Fourth of July carnival is genuinely disturbing, and sets the tone for the rest of the film. The Bay is the most disturbing movie I've seen in years. Every horror fan should seek it out.

While many will take this movie for "another found footage flick", those who look further will find a skillfully directed and suspenseful movie. The story, as expected, is very straightforward: Small town population starts falling victim to mysterious virus, bodies start piling, government involvement and foul play are being suspected. Even though there is lots of gruesome imagery and some great jump scares, this movie leans more on the tension built up though the masterful editing of said found footage, collected through all possible forms of (digital) media like security camera's, Skype chats, Facetime streams and of course the oft (and over-)used digital camcorder. Where most of these sort of movies have you wondering why on earth someone would be filming this instead of getting oneself to safety, The Bay largely escapes this pitfall by using as many different camera sources as possible. I admit that when I first saw the trailer I wondered what the hell went wrong for Oscar-winner Barry Levinson to be making a found footage film, a popular genre, in part due to it's low production cost, suffering from an over saturated market due to a torrent of cheaply made films by novice filmmakers. After watching it however, The Bay comes across as an exercise by the master, showing todays aspiring filmmakers exactly how it's done. Ironically this movie runs the risk of getting lost in a sea of films with a similar premise. Most of which aren't better made, but might deliver better for the audience they are aimed at. Even though this isn't exactly a horror film with a big scare factor along the lines of Paranormal Activity or Rec, it is an extremely suspenseful thriller worth watching.

It is very clear that the reviewer only watch the trailer and not the film, since the film is not about zombies. This is a rare, and great mockumentary, about 10 mins in you will feel that you are watching a real documentary, instead of same old found footage garbage. The film is nicely edited, and footage very well organized, and they seem so real, you are gonna forget it's all fake. Personally I don't usually go for this kind of film, but this one surprised me, it's more drama than horror, but still scary or gory enough for the horror fans. Great film with horror elements, and very strong envirmental message, give it a try, you wont regret it.