The final footage captured on the handheld camera of three students who went missing in the misty depths of the Maryland woods bears the hallmarks of a dark nightmare where reality and fiction blur. Directed by Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez, the film meticulously traces the growing paranoia and helplessness of the young people who lost their way while out filming a documentary. The invisible threat lurking among the trees, the echoing sounds of stones in the forest, and the compass needle going haywire make visible the pressure that nature and local legends exert on the human mind. This dark journey, in which the raw aesthetic of found footage is brought to the big screen, draws the audience into the same sense of entrapment as the characters.

23 wins & 27 nominations total